The Coffee Gardens, Watermelon Co-Ferment, Uganda | Fruit Fermentation MUK-7695

The Coffee Gardens was established in 2017 with the goal of producing incredible specialty coffee in an ethical way, offering a transparent and direct link between coffee farmers and coffee consumers. At the start of the 2022 season they dismantled their old washing station and rebuilt it a new site to be able to expand their capacity to produce more coffee.

The Coffee Gardens Project has been established for many purposes: to improve farmers’ income and livelihoods, create and provide rural employment, promote gender equality, increase transparency and traceability throughout the supply chain, promote and work on environmental protection in the area and to provide farmer training in Good Agricultural Practises (GAP). 

The Coffee Gardens also incentivise and reward farmers in a number of different monetary and non-monetary ways. These include; post-season bonuses, additional income-generating and employment opportunities, tree distribution and a range of all-year-round training programs. The Coffee Gardens is transparent with their partner farmers about buying policy and prices, providing each registered farmer with a contract and a buying-record book, communicating any price changes via SMS to registered farmers, and providing receipts for every transaction. 

The coffee in this micro-lot is produced by the farmers on the mountain above The Coffee Gardens’ washing station. The farmers bring the coffee down to the processing station themselves, earning extra income. 

This lot was harvested in January 2023 and is an experimental lot produced for the first time this season. The coffee is fermented for 100 hours in cherry in the tank covered by a tarpaulin. It is then pulped and submerged in tanks for a 40hr signature fermentation before the drying process.

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