“The world was missing the chance to taste this piece of our history,” Daniel Roa Farías, one of the co-founders of Tributo Café in Venezuela, tells me early in our conversation. “Few people know that coffee was a protagonist in our country long before oil.”
Indeed, well before Venezuela emerged as a global oil powerhouse—home to the largest proven crude reserves in the world, more than 300 billion barrels—it was a coffee nation, owing to the crops first brought in the 18th century by the Spanish. Coffee went on to become deeply woven into the fabric of the country’s culture and economy. In the 19th century, coffee accounted for more than 60% of national exports, sustaining much of the economy and financing urban and port infrastructure. Grown mostly in the Andean regions (the mountain range that runs the length of South America ending in Venezuela), Venezuelan coffee gained international prestige and ranked among the most coveted products in Latin America, alongside the country’s celebrated chocolate.
When oil was discovered in Venezuela in the 1920s, coffee quietly slipped from the country’s main stage. For decades, it had defined identity and export pride. But as the black gold began to flow, the beans that once anchored Venezuela’s rural economy were pushed into the background. It is that forgotten legacy that Roa Farías, along with his partner Amanda Dudamel and lifelong friend Edwin Acosta, is trying to revive. In 2023, the trio launched Tributo, a from-farm-to-cup coffee project built on the idea that Venezuela could reclaim its place among the world’s great coffee origins.
In a new feature for Sprudge Special Projects Desk, journalist Rafael Tonon reports on a new coffee company helping write a fresh chapter in Venezuela’s storied coffee history. Perhaps you’ve seen Venezuela in the news recently; this story is another glimpse into what’s happening right now in the country, and how coffee might continue to play a role in Venezuela’s future.
Special Projects Desk is a hub for long-form original journalism and select archival features on Sprudge. Since 2009, Sprudge has been the world’s premier home for thought-provoking coffee journalism, evocative photo essays, design deep-dives, and cultural narratives. Special Projects Desk continues this tradition in 2023 and beyond, platforming exceptional works from the field of coffee journalism.
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