Mexico Chiapas - Seleccion Motozintla Siltepec

Cup notes available upon arrival
Log in to view price
Bag Weight 69 KG BAG
Harvest Season 2024/25
Status ETA Jun 2025
Lot Number P613683-2
  • Out of Stock Bag(s)
Log In To Buy / Sample

About This Coffee

High in the Sierra Madre de Chiapas, the smallholder producers of Siltepec, Motozintla cultivate coffee on the steep, green slopes that edge the Guatemalan border. These farmers work on plots often no larger than 2 hectares, scattered across altitudes from 1,200 to 1,700 meters. Here, coffee is a livelihood and a legacy—handed down through families who have worked this land for generations. Each farm is a deeply personal operation, where hand-picked cherries are pulped, fermented, washed, and dried right at home. The scale is small, the effort is immense, and the pride in the final product is unmistakable. This is coffee grown and crafted in the most human sense of the word: by hand, by feel, and by heart.

Country of Origin Mexico
Region Motozintla, Chiapas
Producer Type Small Holder Farmers
Farm Name Various smallholders
Processing Description Fermented 12-17hrs, sun-dried on roofs & patios
Growing Altitude 1500m - 1900m
Harvest Season 2024/25
Bag Weight 69 KG BAG
Bag Type Grain Pro / Ecotact
Plant Species Arabica
Variety Bourbon, Catuai, Caturra, Typica

History of Coffee in Mexico

With seeds from the Caribbean, cultivation began in Veracruz, where custom house records indicate a few hundred bags of coffee were exported as early as 1802. But these exports were apparently anomalous because after 1805 coffee would not be exported again for twenty years, after the war of independence. Production did increase over this period, presumably for domestic trade and consumption. In 1817, a planter named Don Juan Antonio Gomez started “intensive cultivation” further south, where coffee thrived at high altitudes. By 1826 there were half a million trees in Cordoba and Mexican coffee was being exported.  In 1828, seeds—or possibly plants—from Arabia (Yemen) were planted in Uruapan, near the Pacific coast west of Mexico City, by Jose Mariano Michelena. Trees were brought from Guatemala to be planted in the southern state of Chiapas in 1847, and  Oaxaca would become the third largest producer of Mexican coffee by 1889.  

Growing Coffee in Mexico

Mexican coffee grows in 15 states throughout the southern half of the country but over 90% comes from four states: Veracruz, Oaxaca, Chiapas, and Puebla. Specialty coffee comes from the highlands of Veracruz on the gulf coast, the mountains of Oaxaca and Chiapas at the southern tip of Mexico. In Veracruz coffee grows from 1,100-1,660 m.a.s.l. In Chiapas coffee grows from 1,300-1,700 m.a.s.l. In Oaxaca coffee grows from 900-1,650 m.a.s.l. Coffee is grown by more than half a million farmers, 95% of these being smallholders cultivating less than three hectares and 85% of Mexico’s coffee farmers are indigenous Mexicans. Most Mexican coffee is grown under shade and Mexico is one of the world’s largest producers of certified organic coffee and Fair Trade coffee. Most Mexican coffee is Bourbon, Catura, Maragogype, or Mundo Novo, though other varieties can be found. Mexico grows almost no Robusta.  

  • Region Motozintla, Chiapas
  • Farm Name Various smallholders
  • Producer Type Small Holder Farmers
  • Processing Description Fermented 12-17hrs, sun-dried on roofs & patios
  • Bag Type Grain Pro / Ecotact
  • Plant Species Arabica
  • Variety Bourbon, Catuai, Caturra, Typica
  • Min Growing Altitude 1500m
  • Max Growing Altitude 1900m
  • On Sale No
  • Top Lot No
  • Status Afloat
  • Coffee Grade MEX CA WA SHG
  • CTRM Contract Number P613683-2
  • Country of Origin Mexico
  • Warehouse Continental NJ