Tanzania AB - Makonga

Smooth, maple syrup, pomegranate, cherry cola
TOP LOT
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Bag Weight 60 KG BAG
Harvest Season 2023/24
Status Spot
Lot Number P613036-6
  • 21 Bag(s)
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About This Coffee

Makonga AMCOS (Agricultural and Marketing Cooperative Society) was founded in 2018, split off from another nearby-but-not-nearby-enough society named Ilela, to provide more convenient access for the 230 members of the group. Their washing station, or CPU, is growing annually and the group is actively pursuing infrastructure investments. During harvest, smallholder farmers growing in the nearby villages of Makonga, Mtwala, Kilosa and Kioka deliver cherry in the afternoon and early evening, where the coffees are then pulped, sorted into grades and laid on drying tables for 14 to 21 days.

Country of Origin Tanzania
Region Ruvuma, Mbinga
Producer Type Washing Station
Farm Name Various smallholders
Processing Washed
Processing Description Overnight fermentation, sun-dried on raised beds
Growing Altitude 1500m
Harvest Season 2023/24
Bag Weight 60 KG BAG
Bag Type Grain Pro / Ecotact
Plant Species Arabica
Variety Bourbon, Kent

History of Coffee in Tanzania

Like other coffee growing regions in East Africa, it seems likely that coffee may have been known as a garden crop grown for barter and consumption (chewing rather than brewing) as early as the 16th century. German occupiers introduced commercial cultivation of at the end of the 19th century and coffee became an exported cash crop. Following WWI, the British took control of the region and the estate model was firmly established for coffee. During the transition years from British “protection” to independence, coffee farming cooperative began to emerge and would eventually dominate coffee production after formal independence in 1961. Today, 95% of coffee farmers are smallholders, growing coffee on less than 5 acres of land.

Growing Coffee in Tanzania

Exports from nearly every coffee growing country in Africa are lower now than they were twenty years ago. The most notable exception is Ethiopia, where coffee exports have reached 3 million bags, nearly double the number in 1997. Less dramatic, but nevertheless unique for Africa, is the strong and steady growth in Tanzania. Taking the average number of bags exported annually 2007-2017—to account for crop fluctuations—Tanzania experienced an increase of 11 percent over the previous 10 years. That might not seem like much until you consider that only two other African countries have experienced growth by the same measure, Ethiopia (37%) and Uganda (1%). Tanzania broke the million bags exported ceiling for the first time in 2009 and did it again in 2013. This increase in exports has coincided with a near 600 percent increase in domestic coffee consumption over twenty years. The only coffee growing country to experience a more dramatic increase is Vietnam, where domestic coffee consumption has grown by 700 percent over the same period.

  • Region Ruvuma, Mbinga
  • Farm Name Various smallholders
  • Producer Type Washing Station
  • Processing Washed
  • Processing Description Overnight fermentation, sun-dried on raised beds
  • Bag Type Grain Pro / Ecotact
  • Plant Species Arabica
  • Variety Bourbon, Kent
  • Min Growing Altitude 1500m
  • On Sale No
  • Top Lot Yes
  • Status Spot
  • Coffee Grade TZA CA WA AB
  • CTRM Contract Number P613036-6
  • Country of Origin Tanzania
  • Warehouse Continental NJ