Tag: specialty coffee farmers

How Long Miles ensures coffee quality, from farm to cup

Written by Robyn-Leigh van Laren in collaboration with ROEST Coffee

Every step that coffee takes in the process from seed to cup impacts its quality. Ensuring coffee quality at every touch point has been a steep learning curve for the Long Miles Coffee team, and is something they are continuously learning to improve with every coffee harvest that comes to pass.

“Could we actually produce specialty coffee in Burundi?“

The Carlson family at Bukeye Washing Station.

When Long Miles’ co-founders, Ben and Kristy Carlson, moved to Burundi in 2011, they quickly realized that the most central place to see transformative change in the lives of coffee farmers and the quality of their coffee was at the washing station. In early 2013, the Carlsons built Bukeye, the first Long Miles Washing Station, with the underlying goal of answering the question, “Could we actually produce specialty coffee in Burundi?”

That same year, Lauren Kagori (née Rosenberg), a PhD candidate from South Africa, joined the Long Miles Team as their first Farmer Relations Officer. Kagori’s role was to understand coffee farmers’ relationship to the washing station. As they began to build trust and work with the coffee farming communities around the washing station, it became clear to Kagori that farmers’ greatest challenge to coffee quality was the lack of access to inputs: fertilizer, lime, mulch, and to some degree access to loans to pay laborers to work on their farms.

“You don’t just engage with farmers a month or two before harvest. It’s a year-round effort.”

Lauren Kagori, Long Miles Coffee’s first Farmer Relations Officer.

By the end of their first harvest, Long Miles produced only eighty bags of coffee- just a quarter of a container. Needless to say, the coffee didn’t taste very good that year and many roasters rejected the lots upon arrival in the United States. “We learned that you don’t just engage with farmers a month or two before harvest; it’s a year-round effort”, Kagori explains.

This was a turning point for Long Miles. They had built a washing station, invested in a community of smallholder coffee growers, and grown a team of people. But there was an obvious limit to the return on their investment if they didn’t invest in bottom lines that went beyond profitability.

Improving Coffee Quality on the Farm

The Long Miles team came up with all sorts of innovative ideas to help guide farmers on how to improve their coffee’s quality. The first set of interns spent hours perusing local paint stores for the exact shade of red that resembled a ripened coffee cherry. The idea was to paint the bases of woven baskets that farmers generally use to collect hand-picked coffee cherries. It quickly went from baskets to dipping small wooden chips in the same red paint that farmers could easily slip in and out of their pockets to compare their ripening cherries against. Back at the washing station, a borehole was drilled so that their team could start processing coffee with clean groundwater instead of water from a nearby river.

Around that time, another challenge was rising, both at the farm level and on the cupping table: the Potato Taste Defect. It took a trip to visit an established coffee producer in Rwanda and interviews with Long Miles’ partner roasters to realize that Potato Taste Defect was a real issue- not just in Burundi, but in neighboring coffee-growing countries too. That’s how the Long Miles Coffee Scouts came to be.

Led by Epaphras Ndikumana, Social and Environmental Impact Leader at Long Miles, the Coffee Scouts guide partner farmers through the cherry picking process on their farms while also scouting for and removing any antestia bugs (the insect linked to the Potato Taste Defect). The Coffee Scouts also encourage farmers to practice floating cherries at home and then again at the washing stations. Standing side-by-side with farmers at the washing stations, the Scouts help to hand-sort their cherries for ripeness and visible defects. Back on the farm, they distribute indigenous and shade trees to partner coffee farmers, encouraging them to plant green manures to improve soil health, mitigate climate change and the productivity of their coffee trees. The Coffee Scouts have been pivotal in improving the quality of Burundi coffee, and the Potato Taste Defect has since become increasingly less common on our cupping tables.

“The activities of our social projects help partner coffee farmers to improve their agricultural practices which increases the productivity and quality of their coffee in the long run”, Ndikumana says. He has done extensive research on how to improve the productivity of Burundian farmers’ coffee trees and soil health, initiating programs like the PIP approach (translated from French as ‘Integrated Farm Plans’) and Farmer Field Schools within the farming communities that Long Miles works with in Burundi.

Long Miles’ Coffee and Quality Production Manager, Seth Nduwayo, adds to this by explaining that, “Our protocols, standards and communication are the most powerful tools that help us to produce quality coffee in a systemized way. We don’t only make efforts to perform well but try to make sure we perform more consistently while also aiming to improve our performance.” Ensuring coffee quality quietly continues long after harvest has ended at the dry mill. Nduwayo and the Long Miles team spend weeks at a time, following their coffee through innumerable quality steps at the mill: from hulling to grading, density sorting, handsorting, weighing, and eventually loading containers for export.

Green grading and sample roasting

On the other side of the world, David Stallings, head of Roaster and Importer Relations, ensures that coffee goes through meticulous quality steps once it reaches the Long Miles Coffee Lab in North America. He starts by measuring the water activity, performing a moisture and UV analysis of the coffee weighing and then roasting each sample using our ROEST. All the relevant physical data about each sample is documented before the process is repeated over and over again before samples are sent to their roasting partners across the globe.

Photo by Julianna Stallings

During coffee season, Stallings typically processes and on ROEST around 120 samples a week:

“The ROEST sample roaster may be the most perfect small-scale machine yet designed to explore the many different aspects of coffee roasting that I learned about through various roasting systems. The capability to develop profiles based on different parameters and the machine’s ability to develop coffee remarkably evenly, coupled with its ease of use and maintenance, make it an essential tool in my professional life.”

Click below to read more about how David Stallings developed the Long Miles ROEST profiles.

Photo by Julianna Stallings

Coffee Quality is about People.

It would be remiss not to acknowledge that there is countless research, processes, and tools, like the ROEST sample roaster, used at every touchpoint along coffee’s journey, but ensuring the quality of Long Miles’ coffee really comes down to people. Each coffee farming family that Long Miles works with. By continuing to listen to their thoughts and understand their challenges and needs, they continue to put steps in place to improve the quality of their coffee. The team of Coffee Scouts, working tirelessly throughout the year guiding partner farmers on best agricultural practices. It’s every member of the Long Miles team, investing in the long-term impact of smallholder coffee farmers in East Africa and the coffee they produce.

All this before any coffee reaches your cup.

August 4, 2021
Before + Now: Emilienne

When she was just sixteen years old, a student named Emilienne fell in love and dropped out of school, choosing marriage over her schoolbooks. In 1993, just four years later, she tragically lost her young husband to the civil war ensuing the assassination of Burundi’s first democratically elected president. Emilienne was five months pregnant with their third child at the time.

“Family is very important to me. When I lost my husband, my mother and brothers helped me with everything.”

Burundi still has ways to go when it comes to the laws underpinning a woman’s right to inheriting, controlling and owning land. She put up an incredible fight when her in-laws tried to chase Emilienne and her two young girls out of her late husband’s home. With a loan from her mother and the support of her brothers, Emilienne was able to buy a piece of land and build a bigger home for her growing family.

“My favorite thing about being a mother is that when you have children, you are not alone.”

It was years later when she would meet Salvator, a widowed coffee farmer from a neighboring hill. Despite living apart from one another for several years, Emilienne and Salvator have since raised four children together. They still walk to see each other every day, and are waiting until their eldest children are married before moving in together.

The last time I had a photo of myself, I was seventeen years old. It was a picture taken by a priest, but stolen during the war. I will keep this photo in my house and always look at it.

I built this house alone. I am proud to have this big house because when I got married, we were living in a small house. My mother helped me by giving me a loan and I am still paying her back.

My son Irakoze’s chickens. He took this picture.

A poster in my brother’s house. It’s beautiful. Hanging in front is paper from notebooks that we cut to make decorations. My son learnt how to make them at school.

My brother’s son and daughter. Family is very important to me. During my single life, my brothers helped me so much.

“Before + Now” is dedicated to bringing the voices of marginalized coffee farmers into the field of vision of everyday coffee consumers. It includes a series of photographs made by coffee farmers in Burundi, East Africa as well as a large-format portrait of each farmer. This series makes it possible not only to see life in East Africa and the coffee process, but also to connect clearly with the dreams, fears, and hopes of coffee farmers. Read more about “Before + Now” here.

June 14, 2021
Before + Now: Apollinaire

Apollinaire has grown coffee for more than four decades but rarely had the chance to taste it.

“I only drink coffee when they give it to us at the washing station. Coffee is sweet. I like it more than tea.”

Like many other coffee-farming parents in Burundi, Apollinaire has gone to great lengths teaching his children how to grow and care for coffee. “Children don’t want to grow coffee because they know that their parents have already planted it. They’ll wait until we are no longer around to farm our coffee”, he sighs. “In general, young people are lazy and don’t enjoy farming that much. They are different from older people.”

As the head of three coffee farming associations and an active member of other community-based projects, Apollinaire is also a leader in his community. “It was the first time that I’d heard of farmers having cameras and taking photos,” he says, “but I know that when I show people the photos that I took, it will bring them much joy and happiness.”

At my brother’s house. I took this because I knew I would be getting it back. The last time I had a photo of myself was when I got my identity card in 2005.

A coffee plantation. The cherries were red and ripe. Athanase, my friend, is on the bicycle. He was borrowing it so that he could deliver his coffee to the washing station.

My cow. It’s very important to me. It gives me fertilizer and it will give birth soon. I’m happy because then I will have milk to sell and give to my grandchildren.

These are small zucchinis that I planted in my coffee plantation. We eat the root and the leaves, but they also protect the soil.

My big tea plantation that has been stolen by my cousin. We went to court and I won the case, but my cousin’s workers are still picking tea in the plantation. This is something that hurts me, but I hope in the future I will have it back again.

This is where we sell our tea and it gets put in the truck. I drink it, but coffee is sweeter, and I like it more than tea.

“Before + Now” is dedicated to bringing the voices of marginalized coffee farmers into the field of everyday coffee consumers. It includes a series of photographs made by coffee farmers in Burundi, East Africa as well as a large-format portrait of each farmer. This series makes it possible not only to see life in East Africa and the coffee process, but also to connect clearly with the dreams, fears, and hopes of coffee farmers. Read more about “Before + Now” here.

June 14, 2021
A guide to working with Long Miles Coffee
We’re often asked the question, “How do I begin working with Long Miles?”

Irrespective of your size or location, the process always begins the same: Talk to us. Whether you are buying one bag or five containers, we want to know you. Few industries are as relational as coffee and we take this element of our industry very seriously – it is our sincerest pleasure to do so. The best way to be in touch is to email David Stallings, who handles Roaster and Importer Relations.

Regardless of where you are located and how much coffee you are looking to source from and/or through Long Miles, our goal is always the same: To interact directly with you and to keep you connected to a transparent and equitable supply chain.

Once you reach out we will schedule a phone/Zoom call or continue the conversation over email, whatever is best for you and the time zones we find ourselves working to reconcile. Together we will discuss your needs in many areas: The types of coffees you are looking for, the volumes of coffees you are looking for, and more. From there we will work together on a plan that works for your business. This can look any number of ways. Typically one of two primary paths will be decided upon:
1. Roasters purchasing less than a full pallet (ten bags) of coffee from any given origin in any given year are typically referred to our importing partners – more on this below. In most cases and markets, our importing partners take a certain amount of Long Miles coffee into their position specifically with the intention to service our smaller clients. This is not done, by any means, to “hand-off” smaller roasters. In fact, we began operating this way to make sure that our one bag clients were receiving the exact same level of care and attention as our largest clients. As coffee farmers, producers, and exporters, we are not expertly suited to handling sampling and contracts for the smallest of our partners. We remain, however, 100% committed to these partnerships and are available by email, phone, WhatsApp, etc., at any time in order to make sure you have the tools necessary to represent Long Miles coffees in the marketplace. As stated above, regardless of size, we want every partner to be and feel as connected to the supply chain as they wish.
2. For roasters buying ten+ bags from any given origin each year, you will liaise directly with David for samples, etc. At the appropriate time, David will connect you to our importing partner in your market for contracting, etc.
Once the coffee leaves the country of origin, the primary contact for all things logistics-related will be the importing partner to whom you were introduced by our team. These critical partners will see the coffee safely from port to port, oversee the legal process of getting the coffee into the country/region of delivery, and oversee the logistical process of getting the coffee from the port and into a warehouse. Finally, they will be your primary point of contact for releasing the coffee from the warehouse, paying for the coffee, and seeing that the coffee gets to your business. All of that being said, our team remains at your service throughout the entire process. Whether you have a question about the current state of the coffee or a question surrounding information related to the coffee itself, we are and always will be here for you.

David Stallings, head of Roaster and Importer Relations. Photo by Julianna Stallings.

Photo by Julianna Stallings.

To better understand why we operate as we do, it may be helpful to note something about who, exactly, Long Miles is. As owners and operators of washing stations in multiple East African nations, we are coffee producers. As owners of farms, we are coffee farmers. We are also coffee exporters. There are other labels that can be applied to Long Miles in East Africa but these are the most important for the sake of this guide.

It may also be helpful to make clear what Long Miles is not. Most notably, Long Miles is not a coffee importer. There are a number of implications associated with this. Firstly, and most importantly, we partner with importers. We are frequently asked questions such as, “Can we buy directly from you and not involve an importer?” The simple answer to that is, “No, that is not possible.” It’s not possible because it’s not legally possible. Unless you live in the country in which the coffee was produced, it must be legally exported by an entity and it must be legally imported by another. There is no way around this. The closest thing that we can do to not involve an importer is to air freight our coffee directly to you. Even then, someone is technically importing the coffee, whether that be your business or a representative you hire. Furthermore, while there are legitimate reasons to occasionally air freight coffee, it is by no means a sustainable approach to coffee logistics – economically or ecologically.

Secondly, the importing partners we work with differ from market to market. We partner with companies based on a certain set of criteria: A general alignment on vision surrounding the purported goals of specialty coffee, the degree to which key roaster partnerships in the market endorse the importer, how expert the importer is in that particular market, how reasonably priced the importer is, etc. No single one of these is the most important factor under consideration. Rather, we weigh each of these points and consider the complete picture. If you are of the size that you are purchasing full or near-full container loads, our logistics team would be more than happy to liaise with an importer of your choice.

The third implication of not being a coffee importer is the fact that we do not typically have an Offer List, nor are we always able to clearly answer questions surrounding the exact final price of any given coffee. We will always be able to tell you the price to purchase the coffee from the country of origin, as this is the price we sell the coffee to importers for. That said, importers provide a service – and no small one at that. Not only are they handling global logistics, they also finance the coffee from the time that it leaves the country of origin to the time your roastery or business takes possession of it. There is a cost associated with shipping, importation, customs clearance, etc., and then the importer also needs to include a margin to cover their own expenses and to make a small profit. On top of all of this, coffee is nearly always bought and sold in U.S. dollars. If your roastery is located somewhere in the world where you will be invoiced in a currency other than USD, then of course the exchange rate and the exact time of the currency exchange needs to be taken into consideration, as well. We do know, generally, the prices charged by our importing partners and will do our best to provide a reasonably accurate quote upon request. Furthermore, we will be more than happy to connect you with our importing partners in order to get an exact logistics quote.

We are writing this post in early June, 2021. The Burundi harvest season is just beginning to ramp up. As such, if you are interested in beginning a relationship with Long Miles Coffee, and particularly if you are interested in purchasing Burundi coffee, now is the ideal time to reach out and make a plan surrounding this harvest.
June 4, 2021
The roads to coffee production at Long Miles Coffee

Every coffee that is picked and processed needs a home, which is why coffee production takes different roads within our company.

Raised drying beds at Bukeye Washing Station in Burundi

The first road, modeled in Burundi, includes washing station ownership. In Burundi, we work with 5,500 smallholding farmers- who each grow less than a bag of coffee per annum- to produce and bring to market the coffee they grow. To accomplish this, we own three washing stations and work with farmers on eleven unique hills. Another crucial part of this model is farming. We own coffee farms that stand alongside our smallholding farmers. These farms act as model farms for the surrounding communities as well as give us a chance to experiment with and control some of the variables in growing coffee.

Haron Wachira and Ben Carlson hand-sorting coffee at Thunguri Washing Station in Kenya

The second road coffee production takes within our company is partnership. In Kenya for example, we are partnering with Haron Wachira to rehabilitate and refurbish the Wachira family’s dormant coffee factory and farm located on Mount Kenya, in Kirinyaga County. In our first season, we worked directly with thirty coffee farming families who live in the community. While the Wachira Group is not solely focused on coffee, we share the same vision of working with small-scale coffee farmers to improve their production, access to markets, and the price paid for their coffee.

Raised drying beds at Heza Washing Station in Burundi

We can’t control how much coffee is produced in a season, which is why the third road that coffee production takes at Long Miles is sourcing from partnering coffee producers. Our intention is always to produce our own coffee, but some years we will also share coffees from local partnering coffee producers that have stood out to us on the cupping table. Partnering with these coffees enables us to continue year-round projects and programs that have become essential to who we are, whether that is our team of Long Miles Coffee Scouts, our Trees For Kibira reforestation project, or running Farmer Field Schools– to name a few.

No matter which of these roads we take, our end goal is the same: producing excellent coffees, uplifting the smallholding farmers who grow them, and meeting you, our roasting partners, where you’re at. You might already know this or be familiar with these names, but these are the coffees that our company produces:

Long Miles Micro-lots

To us, micro-lots are coffees that have been carefully curated based on two primary factors: traceable down to a distinct geographical locale where the coffee was grown, and a cup score of 86+ designated by our team. Each delivery of coffee cherry that we receive from our partner farmers at one of our washing stations is sorted and processed differently, depending on the country of origin.

Kibira Micro-lots

Kibira micro-lots are coffees that have been processed by coffee producers surrounding our Long Miles Washing Stations. Our cupping lab and quality control team cups through many dozens of lots in order to find the best coffees to partner with. We source these 86+ scoring coffees knowing that at every step of the way they have been processed according to the Long Miles Coffee standard. Partnering with these coffees enables us to continue programs that have become essential to who we are, namely the Long Miles Coffee Scouts and Trees For Kibira.

Kibira

Kibira lots represent coffees that have been sourced from partnering coffee producers. These coffees, ranging in quality and price, are tailored to your needs based on pre-harvest conversations and are typically contracted in larger quantities.

Hills

Our priority is to produce coffee that is of micro-lot quality, yet some of the coffees that we process fall slightly below the 86 mark designated by our team. Coffees that score between 84-85 points, are blended together and are traceable by washing station and called “Hills.”

If you have any questions about our coffee, please get in touch!

May 25, 2021
Before + Now: Dorothy

“We know that people who buy the coffee are interested to know where it comes from.”

With her loveable personality and seemingly endless wisdom, Dorothy is an anchor in her community. At forty-three years old, she’s no stranger to farming coffee. Her family has been growing it since the 1970s. Farming coffee isn’t difficult, she says, but it takes diligence and hard work.

“Coffee is like raising a child. You have to wash them, nurture them, and look after them.”

The happiest moment in Dorothy’s life was when she learned that she was pregnant. Having been told by doctors that she wouldn’t be able to conceive, falling pregnant with her first daughter (and the five children that followed) was a tremendous source of joy.

Dorothy tries to include her children in the farming process as much as she can, passing on what she’s learned from her grandmother. Growing up, Dorothy’s mom gave her to her grandmother to be raised because she had little means to do so by herself.

“My grandmother became the person who taught me about life and the way to live. She taught me everything I know.”

When she goes out to work on their family’s fields, her youngest daughter tends to follow. She’s recently been teaching her children about the effects of soil erosion, and what they can do to protect the soil. Together, they are planting vegetables around their home and in the small plot of land behind their house to prevent the soil from eroding in the future.

“What is most important though is to lead by example. If I pick up a hoe, they’ll follow and also pick up a hoe.”

Dorothy’s hope for her children is that they finish school but continue to farm, because to her, farming is life.

“The legacy that I would like to leave is to plant coffee trees, so that my children can look at them in the future and say, ‘My mom planted these’.”

“I want to teach them that those coffee trees are not permanent; that they must change them when they get old, so that their children will see them in the future.”

“I was taking photos, hour by hour, of my everyday activities. When you wake up, you wash your face and brush your teeth.”

“I was going to plant yams.”

“An association has helped farmers to keep bees. I was bored staying home, only doing housework. So, I thought let me go out and work with others. As a woman, if you just do housework people think you are not a very important person. I haven’t got a lot of honey…yet.”

“I gave my children each a chicken and one rooster to share. I gave each of my blessings a blessing. Now we will see who gets more chickens. It’s like a test of the blessings. I have to teach them how to have a small business. We don’t know. If school doesn’t go well, the children can start with an idea of what they can do in the future.”

“We were ready to go to church.”

“I took this because of climate change. There is a disease affecting the coffee trees. The coffee cherries are not nice. Some have not ripened, others have dried out. I threw this coffee away.”

“Before + Now” is dedicated to bringing the voices of marginalized coffee farmers into the field of vision of everyday coffee consumers. It includes a series of photographs made by coffee farmers in Burundi, East Africa as well as a large-format portrait of each farmer. This series makes it possible not only to see life in East Africa and the coffee process; but also to connect clearly with the dreams, fears, and hopes of coffee farmers. Read more about “Before + Now” here.

April 29, 2021
Before + Now: Salvator
“I liked seeing other people’s photos and hearing their opinions. Doing that, getting closer as a community, helps us to grow.”

Salvator is a forty-two year old coffee farmer from Gaharo hill in Burundi. He comes from a big family, and is a father to four young children- all of whom he dotes on. “Family is so important to me, especially children. Without them, you cannot be happy.”

During the week, Salvator is not just focused on farming. He is also a member of a Village Savings and Loan Association, the Red Cross, and a traditional brick-making association. It’s not uncommon for people to travel all the way from Bujumbura, the country’s capital city, to the northern province of Muramvya¹ to buy the bricks that are made in this region.

“One of the association’s laws is ‘ubuntu’ or humanity. It is important for me to have ubuntu where I live, in my community.”

To have “Ubuntu” is to respect, love and help each other so that we can grow together. ⁠In Kirundi (the local language spoken in Burundi) “Ubuntu” refers to the grace and humanity of each person that can be shown to other people. It is a complex term that comes from the Bantu languages mostly spoken in Sub-Saharan Africa. It has many interpretations and definitions, but is commonly translated as, “I am because we are.”

“My mom is on the right with my sister who was carrying a baby. They were preparing traditional banana wine that we were going to give as a gift to a relative who was having a party. This is important to me, because no one can manage to prepare a party alone without the help of family, neighbors, and friends. We also used to prepare the wine to drink at home but now there is a disease that attacks the bananas, turning the plant’s leaves yellow. When one banana is attacked, all the trees in the plantation are infected. I had 23 bananas trees but now I have only 5. This disease has particularly affected Munyinya² hill where you can only see a desert where there were once bananas plantations…”

“A salon that belongs to my brother-in-law. He promised to teach me how to style hair.”

“Our Village Savings and Loan Association of twenty members from the neighborhood. We meet twice a month, and everyone contributes the money he/she has. We use this money to give loans to the members and they reimburse with interest. After one year everyone receives the amount they contributed, and we share the interests from loans.”

“I am a member of an association called Dufyature turwanye nyakatsi (Kirundi: “Let’s make bricks and fight against houses made entirely of straw”). We make bricks to sell. This man was finalizing our kiln so that we could fire the bricks. After the sale, we keep the capital in the association’s fund, share the profits, and pay communal tax. We manufacture these bricks ourselves without outside labor and we sell them twice a year.”

“The man had just helped this woman putting the bricks down and she was happy because they were heavy and difficult to carry. The people who do this job have to climb over a mountain to carry the bricks from where they are made to the main road. It’s hard work that is done by poor people who don’t have another choice.”

Footnotes
1. Muramvya is a province in the central part of the country, and also Salvator’s home province.
2. Munyinya hill is a distinct geo-political region in the Muramvya Province.
“Before + Now” is dedicated to bringing the voices of marginalized coffee farmers into the field of vision of everyday coffee consumers. It includes a series of photographs made by coffee farmers in Burundi, East Africa as well as a large-format portrait of each farmer. This series makes it possible not only to see life in East Africa and the coffee process; but also to connect clearly with the dreams, fears, and hopes of coffee farmers. Read more about “Before + Now” here.
April 29, 2021
Before + Now: Mama Claude

“You should never expect something from someone, but we can grow together. Every time I see my friends, we have the same greeting, “Mugenzi, ntuzerinze.”

My friend, don’t expect something.”

Concilie took on the moniker Mama Claude after the birth of her eldest son, Claude. In Burundi (as in many African countries), it’s tradition that a mother takes on the name of her firstborn child. Her wonderful sense of humor, poise, and humility seem to know no bounds.

Mama Claude’s modest brick home, with its teal-blue door and walkway lined with banana trees, is built close to the dirt road that runs through Gahaga hill in Burundi. She lives here with a brood of children and grandchildren- not all hers. If you ever pass by her house, it’s rare to find her there. She’s most likely out working in a field somewhere, whether it’s her own plot of land or helping a friend. As an active member of a Women’s Village Savings and Loan Association, and the Red Cross Association, she’s always busy with something.

Most mornings, she’s up before the sun, cooking breakfast for her family and small team of laborers before heading out the door for the day, a thermos of hot tea in hand.

Mama Claude started farming in 1970, when she was just sixteen years old. She doesn’t just farm coffee; she’s also a tea farmer, and grows an assortment of subsistence crops to sell and feed her family. To her, growing coffee is the means to nourishing her family. Over the years, she’s divided up 600 coffee trees between her eleven grown children, leaving her now with just sixty to look after.

“When I was younger, I was stronger and could farm more quickly.”

At age sixty-six, she now finds it more difficult to farm. The changing climate has brought about significant challenges to coffee farmers in Burundi: prolonged drought, delayed rains and at times not enough rain. The soil, she says, is not as fertile as it used to be and erosion occurs more frequently. Before, people in her community used to plant without using fertilizer and could expect high yields. Now, it’s difficult to grow crops without animals or fertilizer because the soil has become too acidic.

“It’s sad to see someone farming who doesn’t get production. We have to work together to improve our production, our well-being and the well-being of those who buy our crops.”

“I was in my kitchen cooking dinner. I was going to cook taro¹ on firewood and had just lit a lamp that I bought on credit. Sometimes my children help me to cook but this is my job.”

“This is Melanie. We are in an association called Twungurane ubumenyi which means “Improving our skills together”. We’ve been taught how to build a kitchen garden. I took this picture because she has a nice kitchen garden with many kinds of vegetables. You cannot be a member of this association without having a kitchen garden.”

“An employee who was painting our new house with red-colored cement. Even if building a house requires a lot of money, it provides good health and honor in the community. As the house has many rooms, we will be hosting guests. We will give our old house to our young children who are still studying, and we hope that they will transform it.”

“A man who was looking for clay. In one ditch, you can find different kinds of clay. At the top, there is a black clay and after digging deeply, you can find gray clay that can make good quality and expensive bricks.”

“I took this picture of the tiles to show development. When you use them, it is like taking a step forward. Making tiles requires a special clay that you cannot find everywhere. Tiles are less expensive than metal sheets and last for many years.”

Footnotes

1. Taro is a white-fleshed root vegetable that has a mildly sweet taste and a texture like potato. It is widely grown and eaten in Burundi.

“Before + Now” is dedicated to bringing the voices of marginalized coffee farmers into the field of vision of everyday coffee consumers. It includes a series of photographs made by coffee farmers in Burundi, East Africa as well as a large-format portrait of each farmer. This series makes it possible not only to see life in East Africa and the coffee process; but also to connect clearly with the dreams, fears, and hopes of coffee farmers. Read more about “Before + Now” here.

April 29, 2021
Before + Now: Gervais
Gervais is a seventy-nine year old coffee farmer from the small, coffee-producing nation of Burundi, East Africa. He started farming coffee in 1960, when Burundi was just two years shy of gaining its independence from Belgian rule. As the oldest person in his community, he has dubbed himself as the “grandfather of Gaharo hill”; the area where he lives and grows his coffee. That, and the fact that his grandchildren seem to follow him wherever he goes.

“My house is close to the road. Children in the community often pass by my home to visit. I am also the oldest person in my community. I am like the grandfather of Gaharo hill.”

Growing up, his father- a traditional beekeeper- taught him how to build a beehive from the wood of the umwungo tree (more commonly known as polyscias fulva, an evergreen indigenous to Burundi). Even though he never became a beekeeper himself, Gervais still grows these trees to sell the wood.

If you ask him, Gervais will tell you that his coffee farm is a source of pride and joy. He used to have just under 300 Heirloom Bourbon coffee trees planted on the same plot of land that his house stands on, but as he’s gotten older, he’s started giving them away to his children. As an avid member of Farmer Field School, Gervais’ coffee farm is a model that other farmers in the community can visit to learn best farming practices from him.

“The governor of Muramvya¹ once visited my plantation during a local spraying campaign because it is so nice.”

Over the years, he has planted banana palms, bamboo, and avocado trees alongside his coffee to diversify his farm and protect the soil. At one point, he even started a red wiggler worm farm. More recently, Gervais has started producing organic fertilizer for his coffee trees by composting banana stalks and leaves with ash leftover from cooking.

When we asked Gervais what he’ll do with the photos he took, he replied,

“I am going to show my children the photos I took. I want them to remember that I worked in coffee.”

“This is my grandchild. He always comes with me to my plantation. He follows me, wherever I go. He knows that coffee is important. He knows that if we have coffee, we have rice.”

“I was pruning my trees. I always wear my suit. When I was young, I had many suits. Now, I only have this one.”

“My daughter. She was watering the vegetables outside our house.”

“The women who were sorting coffee at the washing station. I love this washing station. It’s encouraging to see women working in coffee, looking after plantations and earning money.”

Footnotes
1. Muramvya is a province in the central part of the country, and also Gervais’ home province.
“Before + Now” is dedicated to bringing the voices of marginalized coffee farmers into the field of vision of everyday coffee consumers. It includes a series of photographs made by coffee farmers in Burundi, East Africa as well as a large-format portrait of each farmer. This series makes it possible not only to see life in East Africa and the coffee process; but also to connect clearly with the dreams, fears, and hopes of coffee farmers. Read more about “Before + Now” here.
April 29, 2021

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