João Nilton Ferreira Julião was one of the first farmers to join IDESAM’s agroforestry coffee programme, before WeForest came on board. “We used to cultivate coffee in the traditional way, with the land as bare as possible. I had never cultivated coffee in the shade,” he says. “A big difference is that we have been able to reduce the workforce, because it is easier to handle. And we clean, sprout and harvest in the shade which is also much more comfortable.” He also appreciates the increased yield (from 9 bags per ha per year before to 16 bags per ha per year now, on average) and the good price he gets for his organic coffee through IDESAM’s commercial spin-off Amazonia Agroflorestal. He is glad, too, that there is no need for contact with pesticides, which could damage his and his family’s health.