Farm info

Coffee Production in Yirgacheffe

Coffee grown in the many districts and kebeles of the Gedeo Zone is often referred to as Heirloom varieties, many of which were propagated and distributed to farmers in the last 40 years. Read more about common Ethiopian coffee varieties. Trees grow in red brown fertile soil under the shade of many tree species including Bibira, Cordia Africana, and the subsistence crop Ensete ventricosum.

In the southern region of Ethiopia, farmers pick coffee selectively, harvesting only ripe cherries individually by hand. Pickers rotate among the trees every eight to ten days, choosing only the cherries which are at peak ripeness. 

Many pickers average approximately 100 to 200 pounds of coffee cherries a day, which will produce 20 to 40 pounds of coffee beans. Each worker’s daily haul is carefully weighed, and each picker is paid on the merit of his or her work. The day’s harvest is then transported to the processing plant.

Washing Station

Biloya washing station is named for the town, called a kebele, of Kore Biloya where it is located, in the Kochere district of the greater Yirgacheffe coffee area within the Gedeo Zone.Coffees brought to the Biloya washing station are grown between 1700-2000 meters above sea level by the 211 smallholders delivering cherry to Biloya who grow coffee on farms roughly 0.5-2.0 hectares in size. Built in 2001, Biloya processes nearly one million kg of coffee cherries per year. The washing station’s 138 raised drying beds cover the 2.5 hectares of land at 1700 masl. Biloya employs both men and women to process both Washed and Natural Coffee.

Natural Processing

Coffee cherries delivered to the washing station are first separated by hand to remove the less dense cherries. The remaining cherry is then taken to raised beds to dry in the sun, which takes about 21 days. Biloya’s employees turn the cherries by hand as the coffees dry. The mesh material allows for airflow both above and below the coffee to prevent the formation of any mildew or mold. 

Natural processed coffee dried with cherry is then milled to remove the husks and stored in the dry mill warehouse. Beans are packaged in clearly marked 60kg bags for export.

Dry Milling

Coffee is prepared for export at Tracon Trading’s coffee cleaning and storage plant on 30,000 sq meters of land in Addis Ababa. The plant is equipped with modern Pinhalense coffee processing machines and a Buhler Z+ color sorter. The machine has the capacity of processing six tons per hour. Beans pass through a final hand sort on conveyor belts. The plant’s six storage silos have a capacity of roughly 15,000 metric tons. The warehouses are clean, with ample lighting and ventilation, which are ideal for maintaining the quality of the coffee.

Region

Yirgacheffe

Yirgacheffe is one of the coffee areas defined by the Ethiopia Commodity Exchange in recognition of the common quality and flavor attributes of coffee grown in the area around Yirgacheffe. This broad coffee area includes part of the Bornea Zone of the Oromia Region and the Gedeo Zone of the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and People’s Region (SNNPR). The Gedeo Zone of SNNPR has five woredas, or districts: Wonago, Bule, Kochere, Gedeb, and Yirgacheffe, the last giving this coffee region its name.

The Kochere woreda is located to the south of Yirgacheffe woreda, to the north of Gedeb woreda, to the east of Oromia Zone and has a total population of more than 130,000 people. The people of Kochere observe many religions, speak many languages, and belong to many ethnic groups, including the Gedo, the Oromo, and the Amhara. The climate in Kochere sees 1592ml annual rainfall with temperatures between 16.5 and 18.3° C.