Caffeine Diplomacy: Nestle to Bring Cuban Coffee to US

[Judi Lynn]

1. The next taste of US-Cuban diplomacy will be coffee-flavored

The next taste of US-Cuban diplomacy will be coffee-flavored

Written by Keenan Steiner

5 hours ago

Havana, Cuba

Whether it’s well-balanced cortadito, a simple espresso, or one of the many coffee concoctions found at Havana’s coffee shops, Cubans are particular about their caffeine. Cuban coffee, as a style, is usually some combination of strong, dark-roast espresso with sweetness from sugar.

Cubans are better known around the world for their rum and cigars than their coffee. But in the mid-1950s, before the revolution, Cuba exported more than 20,000 metric tons (22,000 tons) of coffee to global markets, and official figures in the 1980s often exceeded 12,000 metric tons. Since the Cuban economic collapse following the fall of the Soviet Union, exports from the annual harvest have fallen drastically to just 660 metric tons, according the most recent figures provided by the International Coffee Organization.

In that time, Americans have become rabid and discerning consumers of caffeine. And since the Obama administration made a little-noticed regulatory update in April allowing certain Cuban coffee imports, some entrepreneurs and companies have been racing to make it the first Cuban agricultural good to be commercially exported to the US since the embargo was imposed more than 50 years ago.

Nestle-owned Nespresso, which sells single-serve coffee capsules for its home brewing machines, appears to be winning that race, announcing today that it will begin sales of a Cuban espresso roast in the US in the fall. The coffee was produced by small farmers and purchased from Cubana, a British company that already imports Cuban coffee to Europe, and the state-owned enterprise Cubaexport, Nespresso said. Though its initial purchase is only a few dozen tons, the company plans to invest to increase Cuban farmers’ production through a partnership with sustainable development nonprofit TechnoServe.

More:
http://qz.com/709772/the-next-step-in-u-s-cuban-diplomacy-will-be-coffee-flavored/