Region: Huye District, Kigoma sector in Rwanda’s Southern Province
Altitude: 1700 - 2100 masl
Variety: Red Bourbon; arabica BM139
Processing: Fully washed, 12 - 18 hours fermentation process, dried on raised beds.
Notes: Stone fruit sweetness; nectarine and peach. Red fruited also with a crisp fuji apple note. Body is rounded with flavors of dark chocolate and cocoa nibs. Clean, well balanced and a solid mouthfeel.
Umurage is the third washing station of Bufcoffee and it started its operation in the 2017 season. Founded in 2003 by Epiphanie Mukashyaka, Bufcoffee was founded with several foundational philosophies of which the end product has developed truly special coffees.
Bufcoffee is not only involved in producing and exporting coffee, it aims to benefit small coffee farmers socially and economically. Through training and sharing agricultural information on how to increase coffee yield, improvements to community wealth are shared with smallholder farms. The creation of Bufcoffee has impacted the community of the southern province in terms of economic, health, and educational development. Today, Bufcoffee procures cherries from almost 7,000 smallholder farmers in the Southern province of Rwanda, among them 1,069 are registered members.
The Umurage washing station has a little over 400 registered coffee farmers. The farmers of Umurage get their selected coffee seeds from the Rwanda Agriculture Board and the National Agricultural Export Development Board under advocacy from Bufcoffee as the owner of Umurage. These seeds are Arabica BM139, which are nursery sheltered for one year. From planting phase to harvesting phase, depending on the specific variety, it takes approximately 3-4 years for newly planted coffee bushes to bear fruit. These are the first steps to ensure quality coffee from the very start of the process at seedling.
Cherries are hand-picked when fully ripe and pulped that same evening. A mechanical pulper divides the beans into three grades by weight. After pulping, the coffee is fermented overnight (for around 12-18 hours) then graded again using flotation channels that sort the coffee by weight (the heaviest – or A1 – usually being the best). The wet parchment is then soaked in water for around 24 hours to stabilize moisture content.
