The Taste Of Peace And The Road Forward in Colombia
It was the summer of 2018. I was posted up in a remote training program in Popayán, Colombia, at a coffee technical institute called Tecnicafé. I was the only American in the class, hunched over my notes, trying to translate obscure Spanish agronomy terms into English fast enough to keep up. The classroom buzzed with the low hum of concentration, interrupted only by the occasional scraping of chairs or the clack of chalk against a blackboard.
Then came the sound of engines.
Through the window, I watched a fleet of armored cars climb the dirt path, cutting through the desolate coffee fields. They looked completely out of place, these black hulking machines, dust trailing behind them like ghosts. When they stopped, the doors opened and a formation of armed guards emerged, weapons slung low and eyes scanning the perimeter. And from the back seats stepped several ex-FARC leaders, recently demobilized, walking toward the conference hall like they’d just been invited to church.
I was transfixed. Not afraid, just alert in a way that made everything feel suddenly real. All I knew in that moment was that something important was happening, and whatever it was, I wanted to be part of it.
...could a seed replace a bullet?
This was the beginning of what would become Coffee for Peace in Colombia, a program that asked a simple but impossible question: could a seed replace a bullet? Could coffee truly stand in for coca, not just as a crop, but as an economy, a livelihood, a way of life?
The peace accord that made all this possible had been signed two years earlier, in 2016. It was a historic moment where Colombia, emerging from a war that had lasted more than sixty years, the longest conflict in Latin America. At its root were old wounds: land inequality, rural neglect, political exclusion. The FARC began as a guerrilla movement fighting for agrarian reform. But over time, ideology gave way to an economy. Coca became the fuel that fed the war. Villages were drawn into the drug trade, sometimes willingly, often not. People grew coca because it paid. Because no one came offering something better.
The peace accord tried to change that. It laid out six main points, including rural reform, reintegration of ex-combatants, and the substitution of illicit crops. At its heart was a promise to restore Colombia’s countryside and to give land back to those who had lost it, to build schools and roads, and to offer legal alternatives to the narcotics trade.
Coffee was the crop chosen to carry that hope.
The country already had a legacy of coffee. For over 350 years, it had been cultivated in Colombia’s highlands, traded across oceans, sipped in Paris and Tokyo and New York. But specialty coffee is not just about history. It is about process. It is about soil health, drying techniques, cupping scores, fermentation control. It is a discipline, an art form, and a business. It does not tolerate shortcuts. It demands patience.
The Coffee for Peace in Columbia initiative took this potential seriously. Backed by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), it created a platform where farmers from violent zones could access technical training, distribution support, and international markets. The goal was not charity. It was trade: traceable, dignified, and economically viable.
The program worked with smallholder farmers learning how to identify defects in their green coffee beans, monitor fermentation temperatures, and record moisture content with precision. We trained co-op managers on contract negotiation, export compliance, and organic certification. The idea was to help these communities not just grow coffee, but grow businesses. Businesses that could last beyond the news cycle, beyond the next round of elections, beyond the memories of war.
I remember the first time I heard Cerecencio Peteche's persepctive, a farmer enrolled in the program. He pointed to a row of young coffee plants with pride. “Coffee is a way of life,” he told me. “It’s a good opportunity to make a living in a legal business that our family and children can be proud of.”
The word “pride” came up again and again. Not peace, not even prosperity, but pride. That was the difference. Coffee did not erase what came before, but it gave people something they could own, something they could pass on.
Of course, it wasn’t easy. Some farmers saw better short-term returns with coca. Others lacked infrastructure to process or transport their harvests. The peace itself remained fragile. Violence persisted in some regions. Implementation lagged. Political will ebbed and flowed. But still, over 15,000 smallholders joined the program. They planted trees. They built washing stations. They signed their names to export contracts for the first time.
And here’s the part we don’t talk about enough: intermediaries. Middlemen often get a bad reputation in supply chains, seen as gatekeepers or exploiters. But Coffee for Peace showed how the right kind of intermediary (one that provides training, facilitates trade, and ensures transparency) can be a force for justice. This wasn’t about skimming off the top. It was about building the bottom up. It was about creating the scaffolding for a new kind of economy to take hold.
I still remember the first time I cupped a sample from a participating farmer. Bright acidity, floral aroma, notes of stone fruit and honey. It was clean. Unmistakably complex. This is what peace can taste like.
Not perfect. Not easy. But real.