Conferences
Demonstration Plots Reduce Pest and Financial Risks for Coffee Producers
SongYi Paik, Andrea Kawabata, Matthew Miyahira, Rosemary Gutierrez-Coarite, and Stuart Nakamoto
Summary
Underserved coffee producers in Ka’u, Hawai'i face significant production and financial risks from invasive pests—Coffee Berry Borer (CBB) and Coffee Leaf Rust (CLR)—and limited access to Cooperative Extension services. To overcome language barriers and geographic isolation, we implemented a risk management education program through on-farm demonstration plots to validate new pest management strategies and introduce recordkeeping and crop insurance.
Strip picking removes remaining coffee fruit from the field to reduce the pest load on the next season’s crop. We partnered with three demonstration farms to compare strip picking against conventional (control) practices. This highlighted two key risk management lessons: 1) farm participants and other growers experienced how strip-picked plots significantly decreased CBB infestation, resulting in lower bean damage rates; and 2) we demonstrated that despite the increased labor required for strip picking, the practice increased overall profitability due to higher marketable yields and higher cherry prices for fruit with less damage.
Seeing is believing. Project events focused heavily on on-farm demonstrations and activities that engaged growers and also included Spanish translations. Recordkeeping binders were distributed to attendees and customized to help farmers track farm management activities and financial performance. While still ongoing, our project has reached over 85 participants. Evaluations show that 100% of participants found the demonstration plots, our training events and recordkeeping binders to be effective tools that improved their farm management decisions. Producers also showed interest in other farm management activities, especially those with effects that extended beyond one season, e.g. orchard pruning and fertilization.
Details
| Conference | 2026 Extension Risk Management Education National Conference |
| Presentation Type | Poster |