The indigenous tribal communities of the Nilgiri Reserve base their economy on the collection and cultivation of forest products (including coffee), handing down their cultural, agricultural and linguistic traditions from generation to generation.

Accompanying the indigenous peoples of the Nilgiris Biosphere Reserve in asserting their rights and commercializing their promucts, while safeguarding the environment, are the focus of the 30-year work of the Keystone Foundation, promoter of the Slow Food Nilgiris Coffee Coalition community together with Aadhimalai Pazhangudiyinar Producer Company Ltd. Specifically, the purpose of the local Coffee Coalition community is to accompany the producers of the Kurumba and Irula peoples in marketing the coffee they harvest in the forest.

This Slow Food community fits into a context where there was already another community with the more general goal of “the preservation of traditional food culture and the revitalization of indigenous crops, seeds and recipes in the Nilgiris.”