Researchers from the University of the Andes in Colombia used
spot satellite imagery to map forest cover within the coffee
production landscape. They compared Rainforest Alliance
Certified and noncertified coffee farms, and analyzed forest-
cover fragmentation. Since most farms in the region grow coffee
under shade, forest cover was found to play an important role in
the degree of connectivity in the landscape. (The study is only
available in Spanish.) German immigrants, the Keller family
established their coffee farm in 1899. Just short of a century
later, in 1997, it was the second coffee estate to become
Rainforest Alliance Certified for complying with the
comprehensive environmental and social standards established by
the Sustainable Agriculture Network -- a coalition of
conservation groups coordinated by the Rainforest Alliance.
Today, Finca Santa Isabel is a model of sustainability. More
than twenty years ago Dieter Nottebohm and his wife Holly bought
a verdant coffee farm nestled between two of Guatemal