City folk have it so easy. Most everything you'd want to eat can be found at the grocery store or in a restaurant. What we sometimes take for granted is that the process behind the finished product can be rather long and tedious.
Take coffee. When you want coffee, you can easily go to a Starbucks or a Figaro outlet for a cup of your favorite latte, or grab some beans at the grocery store.
But for Roberto Francisco, it's more than just ordering "tall, grande or venti." When his family decided to go into the business of cafes, he decided to get into the business of roasting. Then from exclusively roasting for the family's chain of cafes, he expanded his business to supply restaurants, resorts and hotels. In the new millennium, he tied up with Boyd's coffee and today they make coffee for select clients. (Such snobs, he-he. But I guess since we'll never taste this select coffee, we'll never miss it!)
I first heard about Robert Francisco when his cousin Joanna, now a freelance editor/writer, invited me to view his book "A Coffee Journal." It's an interesting read as it documents the varieties of Philippine coffee from north to south. He takes it a step further by noting distinguising attitudes towards coffee.
For example, he shared over a phone interview, in the north they drink only the brewed coffee they produce, never three-in-one; but in the south, all the produce is sold, then they buy three-in-one coffee from the store.
Robert says he tries to help the Philippine coffee industry in his own way. He is currently sourcing beans from Mt. Kitanlad in Cagayan de Oro, flying to and from the province himself. I asked if it would be possible for Philippine coffee such as this to achieve Blue Mountain status (so we can get back at the Japs and charge P1,000 per cup!). Unfortunately, because of the lack of supply of Philippine coffee, what some traders do is get cheap coffee from various sources around the world and sell it as "Philippine coffee."
"It's sad more than bad, actually," lamented Robert. "There is a shortage of 70 million kilos of coffee based on annual consumption of 120 million per year. That is why even if I would like to use only Philippine coffee, I am forced to use coffee from other countries because supply does not meet our demand."
This reflects the sad state of agriculture in the country. Another classic case of having all the natural resources on hand, yet being unable to meet demand (ooo, that rhymes).
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