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Fazenda Bela Vista Ltda is in the hands of the Andrade family since 1890, however it was in the mid-forties that Mr. Narciso Ferreira de Andrade, known as "Tapico Bandeira" acquired the plots that belonged to his brothers in the farm.
Currently, the farm is owned by five of his seven children, and is managed by Walter Ferreira de Andrade and his sister Vera Lúcia Andrade Pinto. Since the beginning, producing coffee was the farm's main activity. It also produces mil and other cultivated plants.
The farm has 32 staff houses, all of them occupied by the farm's current employees and their families. All the houses have running water, electricity generated at the farm, and sanitation.
Fazenda Bela Vista Ltda. takes the necessary steps for all its employees to have access to health care, and schooling for their children, which is coordinated with the local authorities of the Municipality of São Sebastião da Grama and provided free of charge, transportation included.
Coffee processing system
Usually, harvesting begins in May. It is at that time that the beans reach their optimum maturation point. Beans are picked manually, because of the local topography - which does not allow the use of machines - consequently generating jobs for approximately 180 individuals from the city and the region, all of them duly registered according to Brazilian labor and employment laws.
The farm picks and processes the maximum amount of cherry beans, to maintain the quality and good characteristics of its coffees.
After coffee is picked, the beans are selectively washed to separate the bóia beans from the cherry beans, and are simultaneous sent to the pulping process, where the ripe beans are pulped and separated from the green beans.
After the above-mentioned phase, coffee is spread on the same day on polished concrete terrace uniformly and in thin layers, in order to avoid coffee fermentation and for it to dry more homogeneously. Subsequently, it is transferred to the mechanical driers, duly designed not to add smoke or substances that may hinder the coffee cup.
After that, the beans are stored in wooden bins until the time they are processed at the farm, which has leading edge equipment.
Concern with quality
The method used at Fazenda Bela Vista Ltda. begins with acquiring the certified seeds, being monitored by an agronomist, since nursery trees are formed in the farms own greenhouses and duly installed in the property not to stress the nursery trees at the time they are planted in the fields.
His primary concern is soil conservation; he avoids clearance of ground by fire and deforestation.
Coffee is planted according to the contour lines after the annual required soil analyses are performed, as well as soil leveling, organic fertilization, mineral fertilization, and intercalated planting of leguminous species, always thinking about adding organic matter to the coffee plantations.
Weeds are strictly controlled in the planting fields.
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