Ethiopia Gedeb Banko Taratu - 300 Smallholder Farmers

About the Producers

Gedeb Banko Taratu, is located in the southern part of Ethiopia Yirgacheffe Gedeb District within the Gedio zone and is one of the highest elevated coffee-growing areas in Ethiopia with a pick altitude of 1900- 2300 meters above sea level where this coffee is grown and prepared.

The annual rainfall is between 1200mm-1599mm. The harvest period is between October -January. The variety of this coffee is Indigenous heirloom. The coffee is named after the town itself.

In Banko Taratu coffee is grown near the farmers' homes Garden and is mainly grown on a small plot of land, coffee is grown from large trees near homes. The coffee has a low overlap of 1000-1800 trees per hectare. It is grown with natural fertilizers.

Coffee is one of the very important things for the Banko Tartu community and it’s a home for many coffee farmers’ families producing, also these areas are some of the most popular and well-known growing regions in the coffee world. They also grow false bananas on the coffee farm to feed themselves and their families.

We receive coffee cherries to our processing sites from over 300 family-owned farmlands in Banko Taratu. Handpicking is the only method of

coffee processing throughout the harvest time, and it is done by farmers and their respective family members.

About the Processing

After conducting the harvesting stage, the washing process is carried out using a washing machine (pulp machine) that uses water to physically brush the skin off of fresh cherries.

The coffee beans are next steeped in fresh spring water for 24 to 48 hours, depending on the weather conditions, for wet fermentation to eliminate any remnants of sugar coating around the cherries (mucilage).

The parchment is carefully channel washed when fermentation is complete. The coffee is next shade-dried for a few days until it reaches 30 percent moisture content, then sundried to 11 percent moisture content on raised African beds. In this technique, the coffee is dried for two weeks, then the well-dried coffee will be transported to Addis Ababa (capital city of Ethiopia) to conduct the next stages where the coffee gets milled and exported from Ethiopia.

Price

The FOB price for this lot was $?.??. [FOB price is the total price of the coffee up to the point of departure from the country; it includes farmgate/price paid to the grower, in-country transportation, and the cost of processing and preparation for export. It does not include the price of freight to the US, US warehousing, US customs charges, or the cost of moving coffee with the US.]

During the harvest season from October through Febuary, the New York C price for coffee was an average of $1.76; the $?.?? FOB price for this coffee includes a significant premium for the farmer above the C market price, which reflects the excellent quality of this coffee. After being imported to a warehouse in the consuming country, the United States, the coffee cost was $5.85/lb. The cost of the shipping from the warehouse to our roastery made our final green price $5.96.

Avg. C Price (at the time of harvest): $1.76

F.O.B Price: $?.??

Ex-Warehouse: $5.85

Final Green Price: $5.96

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