Our New Seasonal Single Origin – Uganda

Every six months, we use our Seasonal Single Origin product to showcase a different origin and a different coffee producer from around the world.

The coffee product is always a single origin (never a blend!), it’s always a specialty grade Arabica and it’s sourced for tasting notes of red berry, hazelnut and milk chocolate.

We especially like to support developing, or up-and-coming, coffee producers. Supporting newer coffee producers in different growing regions forms part of our sustainability initiative.

For the next six months we’re working with Agri Evolve, a profit for purpose business working with smallholder farmers in the Rwenzori Mountains region of Western Uganda.

The coffee we’re using this time is grown at high altitude (1700-1900 metres above sea level). At high altitude, temperatures are lower, and this cool environment is key to growing great-tasting coffee. We hope you can taste the difference!

You can be assured this coffee will always be carefully sourced to the tasting notes that your customers have come to know and love. The Seasonal Single Origin also delivers a bold body which ensures this can be enjoyed with creamy milk or as a flavoursome black coffee.

New Origin Details

Origin: Katanda Trading Centre. Rwenzori Mountains, Uganda.
Harvest: Mar – Jun (main) and Aug – Dec (fly)
Altitude: 1700 – 1900 masl
Varietals: SL28
Region: Munkunyu subcounty, Rwenzori Mountains, Western Uganda
Average Farm Size: 0.7 hectares
Process: Washed
Exporter: Agri Evolve

About Agri Evolve

Agri Evolve have been working with farmers in the Rwenzori mountains since 2016, with the aim of supporting them to improve coffee quality in order to achieve better pricing and build sustainable businesses.

Agri Evolve are a family business – which always makes them a great fit for Ringtons – with deep roots to the Rwenzori region and a longstanding commitment to improving the livelihoods of the smallholder farmers who grow coffee in the mountains. They work with local communities to understand the challenges they face and look to provide solutions and increase revenue to the region via their growing export business to roasters around the world, including Ringtons.

Although coffee has been grown in the Rwenzori region for over a hundred years, the lack of organised infrastructure, remote locations and poor processing in the region meant much that was produced was low quality, natural processed coffee, known as drugar (dried Ugandan arabica).

The Agri Evolve is improving the quality by encouraging farmers to only pick and deliver ripe red cherries. They did this in part by incentivising farmers with higher prices for picking red cherry only. They also set up a network of buying stations across the region so those in remote areas could sell their freshly picked coffee quickly and easily. Furthermore, they invested in washed processing units to be able to supply the roaster market with the more popular and highly regarded, washed arabica.

Today, Agri Evolve have diversified further and have just opened a new site at Nyabirongo, where they now have a fully equipped processing facility including wet mill, solar dryers and a dry mill. This means they are now able to prepare coffee for export straight from the Rwenzoris.

Our coffee buyer visited Agri Evolve several years ago and was immediately hooked by the passion of the Agri Evolve team and the qualities of the arabica being grown on the mountains. Agri Evolve’s mission to develop and improve the livelihoods of farmers from the region resonates with the purpose of the Ringtons Single Origin coffee, so choosing this origin to support made perfect sense. Pictures of the trip below.

About Katanda

Mukunyu is a small area in Uganda, roughly 250km away from the capital, Kampala. Coffee is grown and processed by smallholder farmers in the Katanda area of Munkunyu, on the slopes of the Rwenzori mountains.

The biggest challenge facing coffee farmers in this region are the poor roads, steep slopes and rainfall.

As such they built a washing station to enable them to wash and process their coffee locally, avoiding the need for treacherous daily trips to delivery cherry down the mountain. Carrying out more processing locally also means they can earn a higher price for their coffee so have been able to work on improving quality and consistency.

Agri Evolve work with agripartners to connect them to smallholder farmer groups in the Rwenzori mountains. Agripartners work with both Agri Evolve to provide quality coffee and with smallholder farmers to deliver trainings and agricultural support. They are a vital link between Agri Evolve as the buyer and exporter and the 848 smallholder farmers in the region.

The Katanda washing station is run by agripartners Birumbu Andrew and Kaliba Joseph. Both provide excellent support to both farmers and to Agri Evolve, as well as making improvements to the area. Recently, Birumbu Andrew and farmers from Katanda pooled their post harvest bonuses paid by Agri Evolve to construct and develop a drinking water system for the people in the local community.

Birumbu Andrew and Kaliba Joseph have been invaluable in assisting Agri Evolve with rolling out a mapping app which has enabled them to plot coffee growing areas. This app allows them to understand farm perimeters, potential crop sizes, diversification opportunities plus reforestation opportunities.  So far, Agri Evolve have mapped over 10,000 acres of coffee farms in the Rwenzoris, enabling them to offer more targeting support and make better buying decisions.

Would you like to try our Seasonal Single Origin?

We’re very excited to be working closely with Agrievolve to bring you coffee from this exciting region that has been grown at higher altitude. Please get in touch if you’d like to arrange a tasting. It might be a great addition to your cafe!