BURUNDI, THE COUNTRY THAT LIVES BY AND FOR COFFEE

In Burundi, coffee employs more than 2 million people in a country where 11 million people live, and which has an unemployment rate of more than 50%. For this reason, coffee is the industry that drives and sustains the country's economy.

In 1940 the Belgian colonial government introduced coffee in the country, in production and export, because it is a location with perfect agricultural and climatic conditions. All the coffee trees found in Burundi are Red Bourbon and are controlled by the government for quality reasons.

We will talk a little more about Burundi Gahahe and Burundi Nemba since they are the coffees we offer at Nomad. Both are located in the province of Kayanza, in the northern part of Burundi, near the border with Rwanda, located at an altitude of over 1800 meters. Kayanza has the reputation of being one of the best coffee producing regions in Burundi, as it has factors such as: high elevations, rich volcanic soils and experienced farmers. The region is also known for being the source of water for the Nile River.

To learn about these and other Washed stations in northern Burundi, it is necessary to learn about the work of Greenco, a company that oversees and structures Washed stations along the entire production chain in the province of Kayanza. They started their work in 2015 and have since dominated all the Cup of Excellence competitions in Burundi. More than 15,000 producer families are assisted by Greenco's agronomists at its 13 central stations. The agronomists are responsible for overseeing best agronomic practices and education, as well as working with cherry growers before, during and after harvest. They also ensure that growers have the tools and knowledge necessary to monitor and determine the best agronomic practices for the growers' own orchards.

Gahahahe's Washed station located in Gahahe, is located at 1,805 meters above sea level. The Washed station is equipped with 10 fermentation tanks, 4 cherry sorting tables, 2 soaking tanks and a drying field with 180 drying tables and 18 pre-drying tables and can process up to 750 metric tons of cherry per season. The Gahahe station collects cherry from many smallholder families with about 200 trees per family and harvesting is done entirely selectively by hand. Once dried, the parchment coffee is bagged and taken to the warehouse. Greenco's team of expert tasters evaluates each lot in the laboratory, separated by season, day and quality. And so the traceability of season, day and quality is maintained throughout the process.

Nemba's Washed station is located at an altitude of 1,818m near the Kibila forest. This station at Washed collects cherries from more than 2,600 coffee farmers and during the season processes more than 400 tons of coffee. The station uses a monitoring system to ensure traceability throughout the production and processing chain. It also has more than two hundred drying tables and can process up to 750 metric tons of cherry coffee annually.

The organizations that operate in Burundi are constantly working to produce better coffee because they know that this is an area with excellent conditions and thus, be able to reach higher prices and make Burundi a strong economy for the families that work in the sector.