B is for Barako, the Big Bean

At 91 years old, Carolina Lapus-Gozon has successfully raised children and grandchildren who are successful professionals. She is the mother of Felipe Gozon, the president of televison network GMA7; Flor Gozon-Tarriela, chairman of the Philippine National Bank; Carolina "Kaye" Gozon-Jimenez, a retired business executive who has ventured into bamboo plantation (she sells her bamboo to furniture makers, interior designers and landscape architects) and engineer and businessman Ben.

They are more than enough reason for motherly pride and Mrs. Gozon can justifiably slow down and take it easy. But she refuses to sit down and "retire"; she wants to continue moving and doing something productive. She found the answer in coffee.

It is admittedly an unlikely product for Mrs. Gozon, because her experience with coffee was limited to a cup during weekdays at the Wilson Hall dormitory, where she lived as a student at UP Manila where she completed a degree in pharmacy. Her early exposure was in rice farm and mill in Nueva Ecija and fishponds in Malabon.

"I can’t plant palay, it is too tedious. I wanted a plant that took longer to grow before harvesting," she explains her choice of coffee.

Last March, Lapus-Gozon ventured into a 30,000-seedling coffee nursery in Antipolo, Rizal. She bought her barako (Liberica) seeds from the Bureau of Plant Industry, which with the help of farm hands she planted in black plastic bags and watered and diligently tended everyday.

"I enjoy going to my nursery in Antipolo. It makes me feel accomplished," she says. The nursery is inside the family’s 100- hectare estate near the quarry, where the bamboo plantation of Kaye 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 enthuses.

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

But Mrs. Gozon was not concerned about any of these issues and never hesitated about setting up the nursery, not even when her closest relatives questioned the wisdom of her plan. But she knew exactly what she wanted: 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," Mrs. Gozon shares. "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."

None of her children or grandchildren could understand why she insisted on spending her money buying coffee seedlings 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 greenery," she says.

Last August, her daughter Flor Gozon-Tarriela, chairman of PNB, happened to sit beside Figaro’s Chit Juan during a business manager’s convention, where Juan was a speaker. Tarriela mentioned her mother’s barako nursery in Antipolo, which excited Juan so much that she asked for an immediate meeting with Mrs. Gozon.

Busy schedules prevented that meeting from taking place until a month later. Juan was invited to the nursery and immediately, they clinched a deal: Figaro would be the exclusive buyer of all coffee seedlings to be produced in Mrs. Gozon’s nursery.

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

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

Figaro is supplying Lipa City Mayor Vilma Santos with all the coffee seedlings she needs to revive the coffee plantations of the city, through the Figaro Foundation. In turn, Figaro Coffee Co. is assured of a stable supply of Liberica or barako beans for its many outlets here and abroad.

Figaro Foundation operates a coffee cart in GMA7, the proceeds of which will be 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 reveals.

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.

"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," Mrs. Gozon insists, which is of course reassuring for local and global coffee traders like Figaro.

Juan hopes that with Mrs. Gozon’s successful venture into a coffee nursery, other people will start thinking of getting into it and supplying the requirements of other coffee traders of the country.

For those who are thinking of going into coffee, a god place to start is Barako: The Big Bean, a book launched last week that will give you all you want to know about this wonderful bean. Written by Juan and Dr. Alejandro Mojica, director for research at the Cavite State University, the national research center for coffee.

Published by Anvil, the book explains the different stages of the coffee bean, from the different methods of cultivation to harvest, sorting, marketing and on to its life as one of the world’s most popular beverages. You’ll learn about grading and storing, then grinding and brewing, and go through the intricate ritual of "cupping", which is like wine tasting, complete with distinguishing the subtleties of aroma as well as taste.

The book will also set you straight about common misconceptions (barako refers to a bean variety, Philippine Liberica, and not to a brewed beverage), and provide you with some interesting trivia that may give you a reputation as a coffee connoisseur (there is a large production of barako in Basilan–yes, Basilan of Abu Sayyaf notoriety–that is exported to the Middle East).

And, to go with that perfect cup (which the book also teaches you how to brew, in addition to other variations like Snowcone Barako and Mango-Coffee Twist), there are recipes for suman, bibingka, puto and other kakanins to make your coffee experience complete.

So whether you’re simply looking for that perfect cup or thinking about going into planting coffee, get a good start with Barako: The Big Bean, available at bookstores nationwide.