Ethiopia Habtamu Gato

The area is predominantly surrounded by semi-forest coffee farms, which include diverse forest species. The company has also organized 109 outgrower smallholder farmers: 107 men and 2 women. Their total landholding is 236 ha, all planted with coffee. The company provides training for all outgrower farmers on harvesting, handling, and delivering red-ripe cherries. This training raises awareness and helps ensure coffee quality. At the wet mill, staff weigh and record the cherries, then sort them manually or by machine to separate ripe, overripe, and immature cherries before pulping. Fermentation takes about 20-24 hours, depending on conditions such as temperature and moisture. The fermented and washed parchment coffee is then dried, beginning with skin drying and ending with final drying on raised beds. Workers also manually remove defective pulped beans under shade at the skin-drying table. Drying takes about 10-12 days, until the moisture content reaches the recommended 11-11.5%. At the storage stage, the focus is on conditioning the coffee in the transit warehouse. To maintain traceability and ensure separation, each drying bed has its own serial number.