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Native Atlantic Forest canopy rising above a Brazilian hillside

Sombra

Agroforestry project

( Sombra ) shade, in Portuguese

A ground-breaking initiative in Brazil between Assembly, Volcano Coffee Works, Mió, and the Federal Institute of Espírito Santo

Over five years, 60,000 coffee and non-coffee trees across 15 hectares of Mió’s land, turning full-sun monocrop into forest

Watch the project film

Frost has destroyed roughly half of Brazil’s coffee trees

  • Over 40%

    Brazil accounts for over 40% of the global Arabica coffee volume. Such a significant portion of the world crop means that Brazil’s crop each year defines the global market.

  • Half the trees

    Catastrophic frosts in the last 50 years, the most recent in 2022, have destroyed roughly half of the country’s coffee trees, leaving its wildlife and the world’s coffee industry vulnerable.

  • 11 million hectares

    And by 2030, Brazil could have lost 11 million hectares of agricultural land due to climate change

From full sun to shade

Sombra is being delivered by Assembly in collaboration with our sister brand Volcano Coffee Works, our green coffee partner Mió, and the Federal Institute of Espírito Santo. It aims to showcase how Brazil’s ubiquitous monocrop, full-sun farming system — proven to decimate wildlife, degrade soil diversity and provide coffee plants with no protection from extreme weather events — can be reconfigured as an agroforestry system.

Over five years, we’re funding the reforesting of 60,000 coffee trees and non-coffee trees across a 15-hectare plot of Mió’s land. In doing so, we’ll create a sustainable and integrated management system of different plant species to protect the area from extreme weather conditions, recover soil health and native species diversity, and improve yield from the area at harvest.

Why cedar, macadamia and guapuruvu?

The selection of the trees to be used was driven by two considerations:

  1. Priority was given to trees native to the Atlantic Forest — a highly bio-diverse forest that extends along the entire Atlantic coast of Brazil
  2. Trees with differing growth rates were needed to understand which gave the best protection to coffee plants at different stages of the research

Macadamia

A second annual income crop

( Slow growth rate )

Macadamia nuts require post-harvest processing methods very similar to coffee. This means the same conditions and equipment can be used for both. And, with macadamia also an annual crop, a producer could generate a continuous stream of income by harvesting coffee for one half of the year and macadamia for the other half.

Cedar

Timber to offset the stumping year

( Medium growth rate )

To maintain their health, coffee trees need stumping (cutting back so they regrow) around 12 years after planting, which means a dramatic reduction in the volume of coffee harvested that year. The average life cycle of a cedar tree is also 12 years, so cedars planted at the same time as the coffee can be sold as wood to regain that income.

Guapuruvu

Wood chips to feed the soil

( Fast growth rate )

The guapuruvu tree is a fast-growing species, perfect for chipping. Mature in just one year, wood chips from these trees are being used to nourish the soil all over the Sombra area.

Coffee rows and forest under an open sky on the Sombra plot

Five years of shade

Year 4 of 5

  1. 2023

    Year 1

    • Reforest all land which surrounds Mió’s natural water sources, including creeks, rivers and natural reservoirs. This is critical for establishing and protecting clean water systems.
    • Plant all non-coffee trees on a systematic grid laid out by species, with spacing to allow for mechanised picking, drone-delivered fertiliser and canopy stratification (layering)

  2. 2024

    Year 2

    • Plant all coffee trees once 12-month growth on non-coffee trees is achieved
    • Reforest all remaining land that surrounds coffee plants to complete a contiguous forest system

  3. 2025

    Year 3

    • First harvest of the coffee plants
    • Research into the coffee crop produced — how to manage and scale harvest; relationships between coffee trees and non-coffee trees; how root systems impact yield and quality of crop
    • Sensory analysis of the variants of coffee tree species
    • Nuts and fruits from other trees incorporated into the project

  4. 2026

    Year 4 ( We are here )

    • Continuation of research during annual harvest cycle
    • Publish formal data sets and findings from the project
    • Create a farming practice template with commercial models to accredit the project as a legitimately recognised carbon-negative practice

  5. 2027

    Year 5

    • Implement Sombra methodology across the entirety of the remaining coffee production areas at Mió

Completed year Current year Still to come

What will Sombra achieve?

Sombra will prove that agroforestry land management systems can help to mitigate the threat to the coffee industry of a rapidly warming climate, improve production yields for producers, enable native wildlife to prosper alongside large-scale farming activities, and pave the way for a more sustainable future for Brazil’s coffee industry

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