Guest: Nicole Diefenbach
Company: Roam Bravely, Unravel Merchants, Tablón
Role: Green Coffee Sourceress & Certified SCA Sustainability Professional
Based: Denver, CO
Online: unravelmerchants.com • roambravely.com • tabloncoffee.com
What they drink: A cortado with cow’s milk
Despite the natural urge to take her efforts at spreading the word about regenerative agriculture far and wide, by keeping a narrow focus on the coffee-growing communities of El Salvador, Nicole is able to both enact change and fine-tune the toolbox so that those tools will be able to be passed off to other coffee farming communities around the world in a more polished and more effective package. It is going big by staying narrow. It’s an insightful decision to make and certainly not one that an ego-driven, capitalistic, shorter-term thinker would likely choose.
REGENERATIVE COFFEE DEFINITION
As provided by Nicole Diefenbach:
Regenerative coffee replants forests, restores watersheds, promotes biodiversity, and fosters thriving communities. Regenerative coffee is grown according to holistic land management practices that rebuild soil organic matter and restore degraded soil biodiversity; regenerative coffee results in both carbon drawdown and improvement in the water cycle.
These practices increase crop yields generating higher living incomes for farm workers and producers. By restoring coffee lands located at the highest elevations, everyone benefits. Every town, near and far, can revel in the impact of restoration through reduced flooding, clean water sources, and prospering land.
What affects one affects all.
With increased incomes and healthier environments, communities have broader access to greater health services, basic resources, and education. Regenerative coffee prioritizes socioeconomic equity by supporting the inclusion of women, indigenous, and underrepresented people as they build diversity into the coffee supply chain and positively affect their local and global communities.
5 elements & indicators (how are we demonstrating):
Purpose-driven | Partners with nonprofits who specialize in local and global community-led development. Working alongside a network aimed at strengthening people’s existing capacities and resources, we hold ourselves accountable by contributing to effective transformation.
Traceable impact | Honors collaboration with transparency initiatives for the public and producers. Customers can verify ethical business practices through published green prices while producers expand their market knowledge with insightful data such as roasted coffee prices.
Socioeconomic equity | We support diversity and inclusion by working with women, indigenous, and underrepresented peoples at all levels of our supply stream. Partnering with these groups contributes to greater representation, increased access to opportunities, and dignity for all.
Environmental restoration | Protects biodiversity and focuses on reducing carbon emissions. Coffee forests fortify plant diversification and create homes for native birds and other species while drawing down CO2 and restoring watersheds.
Quality of life mission | We consider and promote thriving livelihoods for staff and supply chain partners up and down the value stream. Dignity for all starts with basic living incomes that enable food sovereignty, secure housing, and access to health care and education.
“That bias that comes with being a coffee professional, like, I don’t really need that when I’m out in nature, and I’m camping, or on the farm.”
• Nicole Diefenbach
KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM THE PODCAST
Nicole has taken on a lot of roles and consults with multiple brands. Ultimately, her goal is to push for the sourcing of more sustainable coffee farming, sourcing, and awareness.
“What do you mean people grow coffee? This is interesting.” People actually grow coffee. They plant the trees that produce cherries into the ground. They provide water and nutrients and protect that tree from attacks by insect and weather. In return, the trees grow fruit for humans (or humans operating machines) to collect for processing. It is easy to feel disconnected from all of the labor and love necessary to grow coffee when we’re grabbing a bag of beans off the shelf somewhere.
Nicole took a professional pause and moved to El Salvador to live on a coffee farm.
The Specialty Coffee Association offers multiple learning tracks in cafe, roastery, sustainability, and coffee trade. Check out all the SCA learning certification tracks here: education.sca.coffee.
Sustainability is a huge term and can be coopted by a greenwashing effort. Regenerative Agriculture, as a term, has power. Nicole wants to infuse it with power by defining it as it applies to environmental, ecological, and societal impact of the farming of coffee. Ss much so that she trademarked the phrase in hopes of using to create change, verifiable change.
Nicole referred to Bext 360 during the podcast. It is a supply chain traceability platform that attempts to track products from beginning to end to create trust between consumers and companies.
What affects one, affects all.
I was definitely sick during this recording.
COFFEE SMARTER PRO
Chris O’Brien of Coffee Cycle Roasting, joined the Coffee Smarter Podcast to talk us through making alt-milk creamers—like nut or oat—at home.
ROAST! INDUSTRY PARTNERS
A huge, on-going thank you to all of this show’s industry partners.
Roastar • Zumbar Coffee & Tea • Steady State Roasting • Mostra Coffee • Coffee Cycle • Camp Coffee Company • Ignite Coffee Company • Ascend Coffee Roasters • Marea Coffee • Cape Horn Green Coffee • Hacea Coffee Source • Crossings Coffee • Sivitz Roasting Machines • Craft 42 Roasters • Me and My Uncle Coffee Roasters • Cozy Canine Coffee
Affiliate marketing: I don’t do a lot of affiliate marketing. This particular product, the Simply Good Coffee Brewer, is one I’ve agreed to promote because I use it almost daily. The original review was written before accepting any sort of affiliate marketing payments. If you click through using our links and end up purchasing a brewer, it will help support R!WC.
Do you want to support the show without subscribing? Help keep us caffeinated by buying us a cup of coffee. Thanks for all your support.
Coffee People: Nicole Diefenbach, Sourceress & Certified SCA Sustainability Professional