Additional Farm Info

Bensa is a washing station located in Sidamo with 800 active farmer members who deliver cherries. This washing station is owned by Testi Coffee Exporters.

Most of these farmers in this region work on small plots of land. Coffee is the main cash crop alongside food crops such as corn, grain and bananas, under the shade of native Birbira, Wanza, and Acacia trees.

Faisel Abdosh is the owner of seven washing stations as well as the owner of the export business. He was joined by his cousin Adam in 2014. Adam used to live in Texas and he moved to Ethiopia to be involved in the family’s growing business. Testi offers coffees at different quality and price levels.

Faisel was exposed to the coffee industry at a young age, he has close relatives who are involved in coffee farming. When asked why speciality coffee, Adam said it was because he likes the challenge. If people tell him something can’t be done, he is even more motivated to achieve it.

Average selling price of farmers per kilo of cherries in 2019/2020 harvest: $0.80/25 birr

Post-Harvest Processing - Washed

Cherries are collected manually and hand sorted later.

Pulping and pre-grading

The cherries are pulped by a traditional Agaarde Discpulper. Skin and fruit pulp are removed before the machine grades the parchment in water as 1st or 2nd quality, determined by density.

Fermentation

Wet fermentation for 72 hours

Washing and grading in channels

Coffees are washed in channels, and graded in water by density. The lower density (lower quality) will float and are removed, leaving only the denser and therefore higher quality beans which are separated as higher grade lots.

Soaked under clean water

After fermentation, soaking takes place for 2 hours

Drying and hand sorting

Coffee is then piled up in layers which are 2cm in height and dried over a 10 day period then followed by hand sorting for 2-4 hours

Warehouse and Supply Chain Management

Warehousing at the washing station

After drying the coffees will be packed in jute bags and stored in the local warehouse onsite, separated by process and grade. Lot sizes can vary from 100 – 300 bags. This process helps condition the coffee and achieve a more uniform humidity. They will normally be stored 1-2 months before they are moved. In some cases the parchment will be hand-sorted in the warehouse.

Transport and logistics

After the harvest season is over the coffees are moved to warehouses and dry mills in Addis. Trucking is expensive in Ethiopia. The coffee trucks must pass a local ECX checkpoint where its contents are graded and registered as an exportable product, before it continues to Addis Ababa.

Warehousing and dry milling

The coffee will sit in parchment in a warehouse in Addis. This is when our team will go to the warehouse and collect the samples from the specific stock lots. It remains in parchment until it is contracted and the destination for shipment is confirmed.

Tropiq Lab and quality control

Through our sister company Tropiq we are on the ground in Addis. We personally collect samples which we cup and grade, and measure humidity and water activity. When the specific lot is selected for purchase we register the contract with a shipping destination and approve it for milling and shipment. We are present at the dry mill during processing, grading and bagging, and we immediately take a PSS sample for approval.

Container stuffing and transport

We generally try to get our containers stuffed in Addis at the dry mills and moved to the port and straight on a vessel in Djibouti. This way we reduce the risk of delays or mistakes at port that frequently happen when moving coffee by truck for stuffing in Djibouti.

The Impact

Testi employs about twenty permanent staff members. In partnership with customers, they have built two schools in Guji and Yirgacheffe. “Most people claim to do activities that support the community, but rarely do they actually follow up in its operation and sustainable execution,” Adam said. The Testi team follow up on the schools they built and supply them with materials needed for a consistent operation. They are now planning on building water pumps to give the community access to clean drinking water.

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