A Century of Coffee Tradition – The Campos Family
At the beginning of the 19th century, the Campos family firmly planted its roots in the countryside of Minas Gerais, in the small town of São Francisco de Paula, located 160 kilometers from the state capital, Belo Horizonte.

Decades passed, and Mário’s family continued to grow. On May 20, 1946, his grandson, Eduardo Pinheiro Campos, was born. The boy became the pride of his father, Francisco, and his mother, Maria Conceição Pinheiro de Campos. Like his father and grandfather before him, he was raised on the family farm, accustomed to rural life.

At the age of 15, however, Eduardo sought greater excitement. A dedicated and sharp-minded student, his intelligence led him to Belo Horizonte, far from his father’s land and the comforts of home.

Yet, fate had other plans—bringing Eduardo back to coffee farming. Still young, he inherited a large piece of land in Presidente Olegário, a town 430 kilometers from Belo Horizonte. He named the farm “Dona Nenem”, in honor of his mother. Now an engineer and a man of agribusiness, Eduardo returned to coffee.

“I started working with coffee farming in the Cerrado region in 1977. In the Patos de Minas region, I was a pioneer in coffee production. Other parts of the Cerrado had some coffee farming, but it was still in its early stages,” Campos proudly recalls.

Precision Coffee Harvesting
Eduardo Campos explains how he ensures selective harvesting to achieve high-quality coffee cherries:

“My harvest is done with machines that already perform selective picking. The selection is based on the ripeness of the beans, which is distinguished by the weight and density of each seed. We adjust the machine to collect only the ripe cherries, leaving the green coffee beans to mature on the tree. A few days later, we return to collect the beans that have now ripened to the ideal stage for harvesting. Any remaining beans are then gathered by hand, in what we call manual repasse. This entire process ensures a high-quality crop.”

Sustainability and Environmental Responsibility
Part of the three farm estates is dedicated to subsistence farming, ensuring that many of the foods consumed by Eduardo's family and workers are grown on-site in Presidente Olegário.

The remaining hectares are untouched, strictly reserved for environmental preservation. Eduardo actively replants native vegetation, compensating for the impact of cattle ranching and coffee cultivation. He also works on recovering permanent preservation areas (APPs)—buffer zones between water sources (streams, lakes, and rivers) and crop fields.

This approach protects water quality and ensures the future of local watersheds.

A Legacy of Innovation in Coffee Farming
For the Campos family, coffee farming has been a centuries-old livelihood. It is a tradition combined with innovation, strengthening local production and the prestige of Brazilian coffee worldwide.

“It is a great satisfaction to work in coffee farming. First, because it is a family tradition—I have been in coffee farming for over 40 years. My father worked in coffee for 70 years, and my grandfather even longer. In total, we can say that coffee has been part of our family for over 100 years—a full century of tradition in coffee farming, always innovating,” calculates Campos.