Raphael Lemmens of Camiguin Island found a lot of opportunities from the bees. Majority of their line of products has a connection to the bee. In fact, he owns The Beehive of Camiguin Island.
Originally a manager of a leading broiler integrator in the Philippines, Raphael fell in love with the Island of Camiguin and created a small business with the use of bees. He recalled starting the Beehive Cafe for about 3 years ago, but his curiosity on coffee started 6-7 years ago thus Tres Marias Coffee was born. He had a farmer plant coffee and have to multiply it to different varieties in Camiguin. He also highlighted doing interplant in the forest. “We interplant coffee in the forest. Because it’s easy to produce organic coffee if you interplant between other trees.” Raphael Added.
They’ve developed the coffee brand the ‘Tres Marias Coffee’ in Camiguin (which means three small volcanoes). He explained the process that they have to the nutty varieties, beans and we roast them in their own place. They roast beans between 3-4 times a week over coconut charcoal. They don’t use electricity or gas, and just use the old style, the coconut charcoal. Raphael tells me that there is a special taste on the coffee plus it’s healthy and organically processed.
They produce their our own organic coffee plus their own honey. Mr. Lemmens actually brought a couple of queen bees from Russia as there were no wild honey bees in the Island. To multiply the bees, they breed them for 2-5 days and up until now, these bees produce 100% high-quality honey.
I asked on how interrelated the honey and the coffee are, he replied, “Yes they’re related to each other. Actually, the honeybees love the flowers of the coffee beans. Macadamia nuts also interplant so anything is providing and very good and delicious honey.”
Mr. Lemmens also made mention that DTI Camiguin helped them promote our product. A lot visit the Beehive Cafe and most often customer buy 10-20 kilos of coffee to bring home to the US, France, and Spain.
Did you find this post helpful? Feel free to share it.
WOWCDO.com is an award-winning Top CDO blog site that aims share the good stories, worth attending events, appetizing food options, must-go places and local personalities from the City of Golden Friendship. Remember, we share ONLY the WOW part of CDO and Northern Mindanao!
Let’s talk, contact us here or email wowcdoblog@gmail.com.