Roastmaster's Select Club: Rwanda Mbilima

This June, Thanksgiving Coffee Company is proud to feature an exceptional coffee from the renowned Dukunde Kawa cooperative in Rwanda as our Roastmaster's Select Coffee Club offering. Dukunde Kawa is renowned for producing some of the brightest and most memorable coffees in Rwanda, thanks to its exceptional business structure and commitment to sustainability.

 

Dukunde Kawa is a shining example of ethical and sustainable coffee production. The cooperative carries multiple certifications, including Fair Trade, Organic, Rainforest Alliance, and UTZ, ensuring that its coffee is grown and processed with the utmost care for the environment and the well-being of its workers. Remarkably, over 80% of Dukunde Kawa's workforce is comprised of women, empowering them and promoting gender equality in the coffee industry.

 

This month's featured coffee comes from the Mbilima washing station, one of Dukunde Kawa's multiple stations located in the Gakenke District, north of Kigali. Established in 2005, Mbilima was created to provide farmers in the area with a more accessible location to deliver their cherry during harvest, ensuring better quality and reducing transportation time. Situated at an impressive elevation of 2,020 meters, Mbilima is one of the highest washing stations in Rwanda. This high altitude, combined with the mineral-rich soil and lush environment, contributes to the exceptional quality of the coffee produced here. The processing at Mbilima is meticulous, involving cherry sorting, flotation, depulping, fermentation, soaking, washing, and careful drying over 14-21 days.

 

Despite its small size compared to other East African coffee-producing countries, Rwanda's coffee has a unique history and terroir that sets it apart from the rest of the continent. Coffee was initially introduced by Belgian colonizers as a cash crop, but it wasn't until the late 2000s that Rwanda's coffee gained international recognition thanks to the Partnership for Enhancing Agriculture in Rwanda Through Linkages (PEARL) initiative. PEARL invested in infrastructure, education, and cooperative organization, vastly improving processing hygiene and traceability. Most significantly, it revived and polished the legacy bourbon genetics that had been abandoned, revealing the snappy acidity, stone fruit flavors, and fragrant herbaceousness that make Rwandan coffee truly unique.

 

Don't miss your chance to experience the exceptional flavor and quality of Dukunde Kawa's coffee from the Mbilima washing station. Join our Roastmaster's Select Coffee Club today and be among the first to savor this remarkable offering from Rwanda. Visit our website to learn more and secure your subscription.