Financing costs apply until the coffee is released.
The coffee story
About Processed in our most centralized wet mill facility, Ibrahim Kiganda and his assistant Ruth Chebet receive cherries at Mountain Harvest’s hub of innovation and research - Sironko Station. Found at the base of Mount Elgon, our field officers funnel cherry from some of the mountain’s most isolated communities in Yilwanako Mayiyi, Buginyanya, Bushiyi, Makali, Bukalasi, and Sipi. Here, our expert staff have full variable control through infrastructure and tested protocols developed for the unique Ugandan context. Remember that Elgon traditionally processes coffee at the homestead! So this is not common for the region. However, it is necessary to learn best processing practices to change the narrative of Ugandan coffee.
A part of our "Paradigm Shifters" offerings, Sironko Station is testimony to how Mountain Harvest is professionalizing the youthful Ugandan population (50% of the population is 17 and under, you read that right!) to enter the coffee industry in new ways. While the traditional way to enter the business is as a farmers, the average farmer is a 64 year old man. Now, as we shift the paradigms of what people expect of Ugandan coffee, these young people are being professionalized in processing, quality control, data analysis, agri-finance, regenerative focused agriculture, and more. While the youth of Uganda become experts in the industry, farmers become the experts of their farm based business. This is the future we envision for Uganda.
Equipped with years of data, Ibrahim fine-tunes his station and staff each season, allowing him to take Mountain Harvest coffees to competitions globally to secure Uganda’s place in the specialty industry. As Uganda’s National Barista Competition winner, you will be sure to see Uganda’s excellence from beehive to barista in these coffees through Ibrahim’s and his team’s work.
Process Red ripe cherries are pulped and placed on raised beds with full mucilage to dry in three stages within the Sironko facility. First, it is placed in our open drying space for 2-3 days. Then it is rotated and monitored within a shaded section up to moisture 15%. For final drying, the coffee is placed in the open drying space until 11 bh% followed by a resting phase to cure and homogenize the parchment in Mountain Harvest's temperature controlled warehouse before milling.
