Zombo Coffee Partners is steadily becoming an economic motor for farmers in the Zombo district in Uganda, while also putting Uganda on the map as a specialty coffee origin. How did its founding members make this possible? What circumstances did they face and how did they overcome them? While working closely with the farmers and supporting their empowerment, Aggrey and Andy also faced other challenges. I sat down with Aggrey and learnt more about the company, Aggrey and the microstations.
Aggrey and Andy, talking, in one of the Zombos’ microstation, during Maarten and Lennart’s visit in May 2022.
Picture by Maarten
““Farmers used to look at coffee as something falling from their trees, they used to only look at coffee when the season came.”
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What brought you to coffee?
When I was growing up as a child we used to harvest coffee to pay for school. We would sell coffee for clothes, but that is in the past. When I look now, I see coffee as one of the best income generating activities that farmers can engage in.
How was Zombo born as a company?
After I met Andy, in 2015, we started talking about how to produce better quality coffee. We mostly circled around one question: how could farmers produce the best coffee when there’s no buyer? No one was willing to offer the best price and we kept having discussions about how we could best support these farmers. This was high quality coffee. And so, in 2018, Andy decided to create a company that could support these farmers. The company would buy the coffee from them and we would export the coffee. We would help the farmers. Empower them and also give them some additional income, plus other benefits. This is how Zombo was born.
From your perspective, how has the micro-stations model developed throughout time?
I think a lot has happened. And as I said, I grew up as a coffee farmer, amongst farmers. I’ve seen how people handle coffee, in terms of the quality, in terms of the value for their coffee, in terms of how people benefit from their coffee. So I realise that we’ve met quite a number of middlemen before, but never before did we have this knowledge about coffee. After harvesting, we used to do anything we wanted with our coffee, and then we simply waited for someone to come and offer us a price, what they wanted. So there was not really a market for our coffee. There was no good market for coffee in Zombo. If I compare what we are doing now at the microstations to what we did back then, a few things have changed. Farmers used to look at coffee as something falling from their trees, they used to only look at coffee when the season came and said “ we’ll go to the tree and sell”. Farmers now see a lot of value in their coffee, they are willing to do a lot more to increase the value of their coffee by putting their efforts and implementing a lot of good agronomic practices so they can have a better coffee.
““Across all the microstations where we are working, everyone knows what it means to produce specialty coffee.” ”
So the knowledge is very much in the farmers, and they really understand. They now do quality control in their stations and they are able to do the harvesting right, from the start. In 2018 cherries were sold at around 700/- per kg (4,900/- per kg of export coffee). I mean there’s not much you can do with this amount. After we came, the cherry price increased each year. In 2022 it reached 2,300/- per kg of cherry (16,100/- per kg of export coffee), more than three times as much. With the microstations in place all the farmers benefit from it because the price of coffee has never gone down since we started working with them. Other buyers follow the price we offer. Competition is now benefiting the farmers. On top of the increased price, after the end of the year the company pays 33% of our net profit to the farmers as a bonus. That is something that is benefiting the farmers. It promotes unity amongst them, it is also giving them the capacity to do financial management: now they are able to manage their money and send their kids to school.
Ayaka microstation facilities.
Their mindset has changed about coffee. They look at coffee as something that has great value. Something that can generate money and so now they use their money to invest. Before, they used their money to drink or they would simply spend it. Now they plan together how to implement their money to improve, they invest in livestock, capital. Some microstations are also cooperatives and they are now able to stand on their own and do some business.
How was the coffee situation in Uganda before this project started?
Well, as I mentioned before, there were companies that were buying coffee, but they were using New York to determine the price. When we came, we didn’t use New York to determine the price. So, this changed everything because the price used to be too low. There were too many middlemen. The weighing scales were really, really terrible, I don’t know how to put it. Farmers now are able to compare the weighing scales we have and the weighing scales they used to have and they found differences of up to 5 kilos per bag of fresh cherry. Also in terms of quality, farmers used to dry their coffee in the ground and other things that are not happening now.
Why did you choose coffee as a life path?
I look at coffee as something that can generate income. I also chose coffee because it's healthy to drink it. And also because it's not as labour intense as other crops, you just need to maintain the plantation. When you cultivate coffee you can also harvest other crops like beans or bananas, so coffee can also generate other incomes from other crops.
How do you drink your coffee?
Locally, the green beans you roast it and then you grind with a stone, you then boil water, add the coffee to it and then you drink. You can add sugar to it. I drink coffee every morning and in the evening.
What do you see as your next step?
On the road to coffee I would love to learn more. I would like to understand more about Q-Cupping, and also about a consumers’ perspective on our coffee. We need to hear their side in order to improve, getting their feedback on our coffee and their recommendations. I would also love to hear some other coffee producers that are doing better than us, and learn something from them. That is something we really want to do. We’ve never been on the map, so we now want to use our reputation to improve. My ambition is to create the best coffee in the world. This is really my ambition.