Finca San Antonio Juayua: Origin of an Origin
San Antonio is the oldest farm in the group. For five generations it has been handed down and carefully cared for, passing through all the economic and political vicissitudes of El Salvador. It is a family tradition that is projected into the future.
Its 1890´s When the ejido system was abolished at the end of the the lands passed into the hands of small owners, who for economic reasons sold them to investors who changed the traditional crops of corn and sugar cane and transformed them into coffee plantations, which at that time it was booming.
Our great-great-grandfather Agustín Alfaro was one of those visionary investors who bet on coffee.
In 1914 Agustín Alfaro died and his son Luis Alfaro Durán inherited it, who with great wisdom and good sense continued with the company, despite the fall in coffee prices during the great economic depression, at the end of the 1920's.
Luis Alfaro Durán not only stood out in the agricultural field, but also actively collaborated in the founding of the Central Reserve Bank of El Salvador, and served as its first president for twenty years (1934-1954), giving the country unprecedented economic stability. and a currency, the Colón, which maintained parity with the dollar until 1984
When Luis Alfaro Durán died in 1971, his daughter Elena Alfaro de Villavicencio inherited the property, who continued with the work, going through the civil war in El Salvador, which ended with the signing of the peace agreements in 1992. During this time, carried out the agrarian reform, which limited the size of the properties to 200 manzanas.
Finca San Antonio was not affected, since it only had 64 manzanas.
Most importantly, In this period the coffee plantations were reduced by Roya, which is a fungus that attacks the leaves and devastates the bushes of the most representative varieties of the country, such as Bourbon, Pacas, and others; however, Elena Alfaro de Villavicencio manages to overcome the situation and preserves the heritage.
In 2011 the children of Elena Alfaro de Villavicencio founded the company San Antonio Juayúa S.A. of C.V. acquiring Finca San Antonio, to continue the coffee tradition.
But we didn’t stop there. Here we find ourselves in the fourth and fifth generation, in the effort to renew the planting of coffee trees and change the varieties susceptible to the attack of Rust for other highly resistant varieties, without detriment to the quality of the cup. We embarked on a beautiful partnership with our Agro- engineer Lean Coffee Management.
We have modified our agricultural procedures to make work more efficient, lower costs, and be able to face low market prices. In other words, make the coffee business viable and profitable. We started by replacing the varieties we had by Sarchimor.
We kept a former Borbon to compare against our resilient Sarchimore.
And not just one
Several varieties of coffee all inside of the Sarchimore family are incorporated. That way if any are vulnerable to rust or other pests, we can replace it without having to start the plantation from scratch
As a result of those activities, our production is now sustainable year after year; We are improving the quality of coffee beans and we offer them at affordable prices to the international market.
