A coffee legend in the making

Carolina Lapus-Gozon, 91, a legendary lady who has raised successful professional children and grandchildren, is yet sowing the seeds of a coffee legend that she hopes to leave behind when the Creator calls.

She ventured last March into a 30,000-seedling barako (Liberica) coffee nursery in Antipolo, Rizal, which is now supplying the planting materials needed by Figaro Coffee Co. in its leased farms in Cavite and Tagaytay as well as farms in Lipa City of Mayor Vilma Santos, which are being revived with new trees.

Figaro Coffee Co. president/CEO Pacita Juan recently forged an agreement with Lipa City Mayor Vilma Santos for the replanting of new coffee seedlings in the province in a bid to revive the lost glamour of Batangas province as the premier coffee supplier in the country.

Under the agreement Figaro Foundation Corp. will supply the seedlings to Lipa City for planting in the province, which will in turn supply the barako beans to Figaro for its local and global markets.

Lapus-Gozon bought her initial seeds from the Bureau of Plant Industry and with the help of farm-hands, planted them in black bags, watered and nurtured them to seedlings.

Lapus-Gozon is the mother of Felipe Gozon, the president of GMA 7; the mother of Flor Gozon-Tarrierla, chairman of the Philippine National Bank; mother of Carolina "Kaye" Gozon-Jimenez, a retired business executive who ventured into bamboo plantation and is married to Menardo Jimenez (retired from GMA 7); and the couple’s son, Butch Jimenez is vice president of Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. "Kaye" Jimenez sells her bamboos to furniture makers, interior designers and landscapers.

"I enjoy going to my nursery in Antipolo. It makes me feel accomplished," she told The STAR The nursery is inside the family’s 100 hectare estate near the quarry, where the bamboo plantation of Kaye Jimenez and other greeneries are planted.

"I feel incomplete in my life if I miss a day going to my nursery. I love seeing the seedlings develop branches and leaves, which gives me a different kind of high as though I have done so much in my life already," she said.

People are afraid of getting into nurseries because they lack an understanding of the industry and potential markets to link up with to ensure the viability of nursery operations, remarked Pacita Juan, chairman/CEO of Figaro Coffee Co. and its foundation, the Figaro Foundation Corp.

But Lapus-Gozon was not concerned about any of these and never had hesitation about the nursery. Not even if she got scorned by her closest relatives. All she wanted was for her to do something productive in her life. "I keep asking for Divine guidance in whatever I do and I asked the Lord what He wanted me to get into," she said .

"Some people who are much younger retire early because they are sick. But I am not sick at all. I don’t want to just stay at home because I feel useless that way. I want to just keep on moving and doing something until He tells me it is time to go," Lapus-Gozon told The STAR.

None of her children or grandchildren could understand why she insists on spending her money buying coffee seeds and taking care of them every single day.

"My children and grandchildren think I am nuts and I’m wasting precious money on such things. But this is what I love to do. I have always loved plants and greeneries," she said.

Last August, her daughter Flor Gozon-Tarriela, chairman of PNB, sat beside Figaro’s Pacita Juan during the business manager’s convention, where Juan spoke. Gozon-Tarriela mentioned to Juan about her mother’s barako nursery in Antipolo, which excited Juan so much that she asked for an immediate meeting with Lapus-Gozon.

It took time because Tarriela had a very busy schedule but the meeting finally materialized a month later. Juan was invited to the nursery and right there, they clinched a deal. Juan became the exclusive buyer of all coffee seedlings to be produced in the nursery.

"Lapus-Gozon must have invested P80,000 already since the start. And when I vowed to buy all 30,000 seedlings to plant in Figaro’s partner-farms namely the Lipa City government’s project to revive the coffee glory of Batangas and the leased farms in Cavite and Tagaytay, Lapus-Gozon was even more delighted," Juan recalled.

The two agreed on the price of P15 per seedling, which means a neat P300,000 to P400,000 for Lapus-Gozon in earnings. "But of course there are mortalities with some seedlings," Juan explained.

Even before the agreement with Lipa City, Figaro Foundation operated a cart in GMA 7, the proceeds of which was halved between the outreach projects of GMA and Figaro Foundation’s information and education campaigns throughout the country.

"A full-blown store was also put up in the Cultural Center of the Philippines by Figaro to operate a coffee information center where we teach people the entire coffee chain from the farm to the cup, " Juan said.

Juan is also vice chairman of the National Coffee Development Board, which strives to revive the old glory of the Philippine coffee industry. The Philippines used to be the third largest exporter of coffee in the world, but is now ironically a major importer of the bean now.

"I will not stop sowing and planting coffee for as long as I live. This is what God told me to do and I will keep doing it," Lapus-Gozon said, which is of course reassuring for local and global coffee traders like Figaro.

Juan said she hopes that with Lapus-Gozon’s successful venture into coffee nursery, other younger people will start thinking of getting into it and supplying the requirements of other coffee traders of the country, who just recently showcased their beans and brew during the Coffee Festival held at Glorietta IV. There were 24 coffee merchants who took part in the Third Coffee Festival.