We are pleased to announce our partnership with Omwani and Agri Evolve on the project of their coffee seedling nursery in the Rwenzori region in Uganda.
As part of our 1% for the Planet commitment, we wanted to introduce projects that have a close link to our supply chain. Whilst we are proud to support local Scottish environmental projects, we have chosen to also link up with our sourcing partners Omwani to launch a project in Uganda, where we already source Dear Green's delicious Bukonzo Dream. Together, we developed a project for farmers to grow 100 coffee seedlings each, of the varieties SL28 (high altitude), SL14 (low altitude).
The coffee importers Omwani hold a strong personal connection, with Agri Evolve farm, a profit-for-purpose B-Corp working with over 15,000 small holder farmers in the far west of Uganda.
Their aim has been to achieve higher yields, better quality, and effective marketing so that farmers improve their productivity, increase income and profitability for themselves, their families, and their communities. With the reality of the consequences of the climate crisis, Agri Evolve supports projects on tree planting, energy efficient stoves, clean water supplies, and Village Savings and Loan Association projects. Their coffee has been imported to the UK since 2018.
Uganda as a Coffee Producing Country
1.8 million households are involved in the coffee industry in Uganda - 99% of these are small holder farmers (this means they manage land of under 5 hecatres). The Ugandan small holder coffee farmers make up 14% of the world’s small holder farmers. (reference World Coffee Research) Uganda is the 2nd largest coffee exporting country in Africa, almost a ⅓ of export earnings come from coffee.
Only 20% of the coffee growing is Arabica coffee, the two coffee varieties SL28 (high altitude), SL14 (low altitude) are the common types. These are more tolerant to drought, susceptible to pests and diseases and have good cupping quality.
Nursery Beds
The seedlings project entails not only planting new coffees, but involve a whole hive of activities, which means training - seedling collection - farmer group meetings - nursery staff.
The majority of people in the pictures are farmers from the local community who will be collecting the seedlings to take back to their gardens, usually 100 seedlings per farmer. Most of these photos were taken when James from Omwani was last in the Rwenzoris and the field officers will have asked the community to come meet some of the roasters on the day.
Some of the beds are also native tree samplings that are also managed by the local communities and provided for shade trees to local farmers.The main 3 trees are Muvule and Musisiyo and Musizi. These are the local names.
Geotagging
With new technology the coffee plants will be geotagged. In essence, Agri Evolve uses a rural sourcing management app to record a range of information that helps them better understand the needs of the communities they work alongside and capture crucial transparency data.
This tool makes it easier for farmers to share important details like farm locations and how much coffee has been harvested. In return, the farmers get an immediate estimate of their coffee's value from Agri Evolve, ensuring they always get the best possible prices, paid on time and an idea of the quality produced.
This app also helps Agri Evolve closely monitor each farmer's earnings across the harvest to see who qualifies for extra support through micro-loan programs and access to essential agricultural inputs; it also provides an important feedback loop that identifies key areas that require training in agricultural management. This allows the field officers to identify the areas that require assistance, intending to improve yield, quality, and in return an increase in farmer payment.
These basically work like ‘Id cards”, so we, at Dear Green, will be able to roast the first coffee beans harvested from the seedlings that will be planted in January.
Farm to Roastery - Roastery to Farm
We hope with funding of new seedlings, we reduce the risk for farmers to invest into new plants. People often don’t want to stump their old trees because their grandfather planted them, as it has given life and money to multiple generations. We hope this becomes a more regular way of investing because the risk should not only lie with the farmer, especially with unpredictable weather conditions affecting the plants due to anthropogenic climate change.
During the project we will talk to the farmers involved and then hopefully visit Agri Evolve in 2025/26. Whilst the local language is Luganda, most people speak English too, especially the younger generation. The smallholder farmers work in cooperatives that have local technicians supporting them. Training is offered in which it has been noticed that women have a higher attendance rate. Therefore, we aim to have a split of 50/50 between women and men being involved in the project to actively empower women to take on the lead role and recognise their hard work. Gender awareness training is offered too. The project will be managed by VSLAs (Village Saving and Loan Association) a commonly used model for project funds, such as micro-financing.
(picture taken by our roaster Anna on her trip to Daterra Farm in Brazil 2024)
What's next:
Germinating will take place in January 2025. We plan to give bi-annual updates on our blog, and visit Agri Evolve in 2025/26.
In three years, we hope to be able to offer the coffee we have supported along the way - this is us learning on how to better support the supply chain and give farmers more security and financial opportunity. This might not be reflected in our carbon reduction journey but has a larger impact.