Our Farm Gate Coffee program aims to pay farmers a fair price for coffee in a direct way.
Farm GateFarm Gate Coffee is the name we give to our direct trade coffee buying program. Farm Gate pricing means that we have negotiated a price directly with the... Coffee is the name we give to Sweet Maria’s and Coffee Shrub’s direct tradeA term used by coffee sellers to indicate that the coffee was purchased through a direct relationship with the farmer. Unlike Fair Trade and Organic certifications, Direct Trade... coffee buying program. Farm Gate pricing means that we have negotiated a price directly with the farmer or association “at the farm gate,” that is, without any of the confusing export and import fees. The prices we pay for our coffees are above Fair TradeFair trade is an organized social movement and market-based approach to empowering developing country producers and promoting sustainability.: Fair trade is an organized social movement and market-based approach... minimums, and with our Farm Gate coffee we can easily verify that the good price we pay makes it to the people who do the work, and are responsible for the great cup quality of our coffee.
Farm Gate is a simple principle that allows us to pay coffee producers premium prices directly for their top quality coffee, which hopefully leads to reinvestment that improves quality even more in the future.
Raking natural coffee at the Guji Highland processing facility in Shakiso
We guarantee that Farm Gate prices are 50% over Fair Trade (“FT”) pricing, but often they are 100%+ more that FT minimums. We support FT, and continue to offer FT lots. Fair Trade is a co-op certification – that is, it does not allow certification for small independent farms – it is for co-ops only. We do support coffee co-ops, but they are often not what consumers might think. There are many excellent co-ops, and many that are large, powerful, corrupt, and mired in bureaucracy.
We sometimes buy from farmer’s cooperatives and associations, and are selective with whom we work with ensuring that the premiums we pay go to the farmers. You might be surprised to know that this often isn’t the case. Fair Trade may certify that the co-operative received a FT price, but it does not guarantee the men and women who produce your coffee reaped those benefits. Also, Fair Trade isn’t based on the quality of the product, so in many ways it has a commodity mindset at its core, that coffee is coffee, just like corn is corn.
Harvesting coffee in Kiambu country, Kenya
On the flip side, bear in mind that FT is a global standard, is verified by certifiers that make regular (if infrequent) visits to the coops. We don’t have a third-party certifier. Instead we substitute our direct involvement at ground level in the buying process with farms, and we know what they received if we are paying them through a middle-person. In this scheme, exporters and importers have a changing role, offering a service as logistics coordinators (and an important one at that) rather than coffee resellers.
Any coffee bought off an importer/broker list does not qualify for Farm Gate, and we do still buy some coffees that way because they are good quality. That doesn’t mean we don’t make sure they’re ethically sourced. It just mean we did not negotiate the business ourselves, and so transparencyTransparency is a flavor characterization synonymous with clarity. It is also a business ethics term, implying that as much information as possible about a product is made available... stops there. There are very few cases where a payment could not be traced back to the initial farmer payments.
Sorting freshly fermented coffee parchment in the shade, Sidama
Please enjoy our Farm Gate Logo with the knowledge that it doesn’t cost 10¢ to put it on a coffee bag, the FT advertising fee on top of all other fees, that goes to Transfair USA.
Photos from the Farm Gate. This collection of travel pictures are in no particular order, and we plan on adding more as we go! Click on each to read the context and travel year.
Alfonso Pillimue, and wife Maria Rosa, San Antonio coffee farmers, and pillars of their community. This photo was taken on a 2015 Colombia trip and our first visit to this part of Inzá. They have been our gracious hosts pretty much every trip since and an integral part of our Inzá sourcing.Leonardo at right, and Fredy at left. This was taken at Finca Los Palomos in Urrao, Colombia, 2015. Sadly this farm was sold and we don’t know if we’ll have the opportunity to buy again.Fredy Morales, of Finca Rosma, at another of his farms, Aguacatones in 2017. Tom (center) with farm workers and export partners at Senna Katta Mountain farm, 2022. This is the only coffee in the Boter Forest Preserve in Limu, and is an amazing natural!Nataniel is their technical adviser. Same guy as advising Dahab yesterdays trip.
2013 just preparing land and planted coffee 2014.
He is from Amhara and she from Jimma. They are both pharmacists and met because opened clinic in limmu kossa and also one in jimma. Her father was coffee agronomist in jimma. but now retired. He advised them. Solomon knows behailu from technoserve and now Starbucks. Land was purchased from an owner who was given government lease to it. They could not improve it. So it was available. Is in misdle of forest with no coffee neighbors. Farm is 130 hectares. 110 hectares is coffee. They supply coffee to put growers and plan to form an association next year.
2 yrs 217 bags. 160 sold to coffee libre in Korea
Last year 320 bags sold to sweet Maria’s. 80 bags transferred locally.
800 bags is target for this year. 700 bags should be specialty.
See note pad for all specific levels info etc. mountain is Katta mountain. Photos on iPhone show location as Botor Tolay. Nice name.
See location note photos solomon wrote. We go through dimtu town, akoo town with large market, then agelo small town closest where the workers come from. Forest is called Boter forest preserve. 5000 hectare. New name for FYS will be Senna coffee. 130 hectares. 115 of coffee. Primarily compact 74110 and 74112. Names: Boter Forest ? Limmu Senna ?Melanie Herrera in Huehue during a 2012 trip. Melanie works for an importer we’ve been buying from for well over a decade. She also has a small farm “Parcela Melanie”, and produces excellent coffee!Juan Sr (front) and Jr (back) at Finca San Luis in El Salvador. We toured their other farm, Miravalles, on this 2022 visit as well and were lucky enough to stay at their lovely cabañas in Ataco.The compact Penagos depulping machine at Nano Challa cooperative in Gera, Western Ethiopia was new when we took this photo back in 2015. They’ve since grown their capacity with larger machinery, and opened a second site called “Genji Challa”, connecting hundreds more farmers in the area to the specialty coffee market. We return to coops like this because of their commitment to reinvestment as a sustainable business practice, and because they consistently produce top quality coffees.This photo is from a 2009 Kenya trip, and taken outside the Gatomboya wet mill in Karatina town.Two trucks, with beds filled to the brim with harvested coffee cherry, back up to a mill in Papua New Guinea. 2011.2015 35mm film shot at the farm of Sero Bebes (pictured), in the Eastern highlands of Papua New Guinea.Marselina Walu is one of the producers we buy from, as well as leading up one of the coops we source from in Bajawa area, Flores. Here she is inside a drying room at the cooperative. 2019.Another shot of Marselia holding the most adorable puppy. Who could resist? Bajawa, Flores.A visit to the Kerinci “Pendekar” cooperative in Sumatra where they are doing a lot to improve quality. This room was filled with dry process lots during our 2022 trip.Cute goats! Has naturals and anaerobic naturals in6023
6024-5 anaerobic natural robusta. I’m interested to taste these robusta coffees that are in aerobic naturals. Daniel says they could get very fruity but that might be good? He has quite a lot of them here.Another member of the “Pendekar” coop. Pendekar means “warrior” in Bahasa, and is a term of endearment between members, and means they’re doing a good job. 2022.Walking coffee farms in the Taurema area of Timor Leste in 2019.Stop at larger coffee area that was Portuguese private company. Then was divided. Huge trees like 20
Feet plus. cherry photos
We go down to farm of mario De Dios and domingos de Jesus Lima. Younger guy. 1825 meters. Photos 8383- all young trees here and they had to wait to plant the coffee till the shade trees screw in, which look like pine but they are called casuara. Seeds come from another area. Pretty much all moka aka Timor hybrid, but some arabe which is typica.
Aifu is area past emera that is 1100-1400 meters or so. Old portuguese coffee area with colonial mansions supposedly. Because it was portugués then Indonesian maybe more varietals from indo there like s794 or others.Yahoo and Google names are used all over. Very amusing. Well, a little bit so. Rwanda, 2010.This is Bosco, the manager at Kageyo washing station in Nyamasheke, Rwanda. Here we are at the drying tables checking out the parchment-covered green coffee. 2019.An indoor drying room at Finca Rosma in Michicoy, Guatemala. 2012.Black and white photograph of the entry sign at Finca El Suyatal in Dipilto region of Nicaragua. 2014.35mm print from the Isende Farmers Cooperative Society in Tanzania, from 2015. I can’t remember if this is Carli or Mutwari, but they sure look in their element at this coffee farm in Tanzania. 2014.Ripe, red coffee cherries spill from a mylar bag at the Chinga Factory in Nyeri, Kenya. Pickers tend to harvest cherries into baskets that are of a manageable size (and weight!), then transfer to these bags for delivering to the coop. 2015.Pak Aulia shows some of the Timor hybrid coffee common to Aceh (Sumatra), called TimTim here and in other growing areas. There are multiple types of Timor Hybrid cultivar, and all are disease resistant and high production plants. 2019.Another shot a Finca Rosma in Huehuetenango, Guatemala, this one from 2012. They dry coffee outside on patios, as well as inside covered drying rooms. The only thing they don’t do is use mechanical dryers!
