Adjuntas

Adjuntas exists because mountains exist in Puerto Rico's center. When coastal sugar plantations dominated the island's economy, the central cordillera's altitude and rainfall created a distinct ecological niche: too steep for cane, perfect for coffee. By the 2022 Census, Adjuntas contained 508 coffee plantations—more than any Puerto Rican municipality—producing shade-grown arabica at elevations where temperature and humidity converge optimally.

Coffee monoculture created vulnerability that community organization addressed. When open-pit mining threatened Adjuntas's watershed in 1980, residents led by Alexis Massol González formed Casa Pueblo—now a 45-year experiment in participatory resistance that runs on solar power and produces its own coffee brand, Café Madre Isla. The 2017 hurricanes that destroyed 80% of Puerto Rico's coffee plantations tested whether community infrastructure could substitute for industrial scale.

The answer proved mixed. Hurricane Fiona added 35% damage in 2022, and labor shortages compound climate stress—average coffee farmer age approaches 65, and post-Maria migration depleted the workforce. Yet Casa Pueblo's 10-cuerda demonstration farm harvested its first self-produced coffee in 2024, proving small-scale cultivation remains viable.

By 2026, Adjuntas will test whether cooperative structure can revive an aging industry. The million Café del Futuro project—distributing climate-smart practice incentives to 2,000 growers across Puerto Rico's coffee municipalities—began its first payments in July 2024. If Adjuntas's farmers can implement shade management and water conservation techniques before the next hurricane season, the mountain municipality may demonstrate that distributed resilience outperforms concentrated efficiency. The alternative is picturesque decline into agritourism dependency.