Collection: Project Coffee

Let's start with our pilot project - the Coffee School Project, which we launched in Buenos Aires, El Salvador in 2022. Together with farmer and coffee producer Rodolfo Ruffatti Batlle, we want to restore the former specialty coffee stronghold of El Salvador to its former greatness.

The region has ideal conditions for growing specialty coffee, but the trade and cultivation of coffee has almost completely come to a standstill in recent years. Dubious coffee traders, leaf rust and the high crime rate were reasons why almost all farmers turned away from growing coffee.

This has resulted in numerous abandoned coffee plantations, even though the soil, climate and nature are ideal for growing the best specialty coffees. With the Coffee School Project and the new project coffees, we are addressing these problems. With targeted training on more productive cultivation, new varieties, new techniques, organic farming as well as harvesting and processing, we want to give local farmers new perspectives.

For this purpose, we have bought our own plantation, where the surrounding farmers are trained. At a central processing station, also known as a mill, we also support the farmers with processing and preparation for export. To date, we have reactivated several hectares of the former plantations together with the farmers.

Another sustainable coffee project is definitely the Community Coffee Rwanda Project (CCR). Coffee from Rwanda is a real specialty, but there are many older farmers who have neglected the care and attention to their coffee plants over the years, partly due to their age.

In addition, the conditions for further processing, i.e. preparation for export, are not exactly ideal. The American Eric Wright recognized precisely these problems and founded the Community Coffee Rwanda cooperative in 2017. First he leased a washing station, then he invested in an area where no coffee had yet been cultivated.

The locals in Rwanda initially met Eric with scepticism. But Eric was not put off and leased a second washing station. At the stations, which are centrally located to the small farmers' plantations, Eric shares his knowledge and years of experience with the small farmers.

They just lacked the resources and knowledge to care for and grow specialty coffee. Today, Eric also focuses on organic farming and leads an ever-growing cooperative that now includes more than 800 farmers and managers.

By purchasing each pack of coffee you support the respective coffee project. How does it work? The rule used to be that farmers only sold their coffee at the ports at the market price. This meant that the farmers ultimately had almost no profit. With the coffee projects we offer farmers competent help with exports and pricing, so that the farmers can enjoy a significant increase in wages and the resulting quality of life through direct trade with the roasters.

The money is also invested in the projects, which also increases the farmers' knowledge and independence. In this way, we want to create a close connection between farmers and roasters, who both benefit equally from the project. The farmer through fair wages, the roaster through the best coffee quality.

A sustainable future in which all farmers have equal opportunities and possibilities is particularly important to us. We have seen a lot on our annual coffee trips to the countries of origin. Unfortunately, we have also seen a lot of negative things, including poor treatment of the surrounding nature, catastrophic working conditions, poor wages and child labor.

All of these aspects urgently need to be improved. As a roasting company that has been cultivating social and sustainable principles for years, we are therefore obliged to take up these aspects and do everything we can to change them permanently. We also hope that the coffee projects will serve as a model for other plantations and cooperatives, so that sustainable and social coffee becomes established step by step.

But what does the help actually look like? How does a project like this work? First of all, we had to appoint a project manager for our project in El Salvador, because as a roastery we have to and want to focus on operations in Germany and cannot be there in person on a permanent basis. Thanks to the long-standing friendly relationship with the Salvadoran farmer and coffee producer Rodolfo Ruffatti Batlle, we were able to recruit a manager for the Coffee School Project who is extremely knowledgeable about the topics surrounding organic farming and is also aware of the problems in the Buenos Aires region.

Then we started looking for a central plantation where we could provide the farmers with the best possible training. There is also a processing station directly connected to it, where the coffee is processed and prepared for export. New methods are also tried out there and biological crop protection products are produced using microorganisms. The farmers can experience all of these processes first hand and thus prepare themselves optimally for an independent future.

As a big bonus, the farmers also get stable trading partners from the western world who import the coffee at a fair price. This creates a new, fair system from which the entire region benefits.