How Much Does Rwandan Coffee Cost? Is Rwandan Coffee Good? Why Are Rwandan Coffee Beans So Rare?

Rwanda's Coffee Excellence: From Adversity to Recognition

As early as 2008, Rwanda joined the Cup of Excellence (COE) green bean competition program. From 2008 to 2013, Rwandan coffee beans had already become a new favorite in the European and American markets.

So why is it so hard to find a good Rwandan coffee, despite the country's inherent quality?

Challenges Facing Rwandan Coffee

First, Rwanda's overall coffee production is relatively low, as its land area suggests. This prevents Rwandan beans from becoming as ubiquitous in the market as the readily available Ethiopian and Kenyan varieties.

Second, despite its high quality, Rwanda's position as a landlocked African country creates significant transportation challenges. Coffee must travel from Rwanda through Tanzania and be exported from Tanzania's Dar es Salaam port. Because Tanzanian coffee is relatively inexpensive and the area has security issues, cargo is frequently vulnerable to robbery or substitution.

In addition, frequent conflicts have severely damaged Rwanda's coffee industry. Even when excellent beans are produced, various factors prevent their export.

Historical Context: The Impact of Conflict

The 1994 Rwandan Civil War and genocide brought immense disaster to the country.

The population changes resulting from the genocide deepened the challenges for an already impoverished nation, with massive loss of labor and the national economy on the brink of collapse.

The genocide also dramatically altered the country's demographic structure, with children under 14 accounting for approximately 40% of the total population and many women left as widows.

Discovery of Exceptional Rwandan Coffee

In March 2018, we finally encountered three varieties of Rwandan green beans at the Shanghai Exhibition. After multiple blind tastings and comparisons, we selected one of the three - ultimately choosing this washed Bourbon from the KOPAKAMA processing station.

In terms of acidity, this Rwandan coffee offers a distinctive berry acidity, setting it apart from Ethiopia's citrus acidity and Kenya's berry acidity. It represents "another category" of distinctive African coffee expression.

In flavor, it presents concrete cherry and plum notes. Only high-grade beans from this region achieve such flavor expression.

We were also pleasantly surprised by the bean's exceptional cleanliness, which indicates it received meticulous care during harvesting and processing.

Later we learned that this bean was frequently a Rwanda COE TOP 10 contender, which explains its outstanding performance. It embodies the typical high-quality Rwandan specialty coffee: high sweetness, berry acidity, clean, full-bodied and smooth mouthfeel, a juicy texture, with plum and cherry flavors.

The Powerful Story Behind the Coffee

When we learned the story behind this bean, we were deeply moved. If you have heard of the Rwandan genocide, you will understand how precious this Rwandan coffee truly is.

This bean comes from the KOPAKAMA washing station, which processes exclusively Red Bourbon varieties. These Red Bourbon beans are mainly harvested by cooperative members. This cooperative does more than grow coffee - it also helps its members improve their living conditions.

For example, 180 widows who survived the 1994 Rwandan genocide formed a group under the cooperative to rebuild their coffee farms. Their earnings are also used to support members facing greater hardship. Today this group has grown to include 302 women members.

Every year we travel to coffee origins to source beans. Whether in Ethiopia or Yunnan, we consistently feel that in mature coffee-consuming countries, coffee may be daily routine or a simple source of happiness; at home it can stand for sophistication and status; but in the producing regions, coffee is blood and sweat, even blood and tears.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Rwanda's berry acidity is best appreciated against the other great East African expressions. FrontStreet Washed Yirgacheffe Staple is the classic starting point. Known for white jasmine, a bright citrus and lemon acidity and a tea-like body, it is the coffee many drinkers try first on the way into specialty coffee, and its accessible price makes it a sensible everyday bean.

For a fruit-forward Ethiopian that echoes Rwanda's berry character more closely, FrontStreet Sidamo Natural Hamasho is a strong pick. The Hamasho processing station is a regular winner in Ethiopian green bean competitions, working mainly with the disease-resistant 74 series released by the Jimma Agricultural Research Center, and its 74158 lot has smaller beans with pronounced floral and fruit aromas. The FrontStreet Hamasho 74158 shows enticing notes of perfume lemon, strawberry and star fruit on the nose, an incredibly clear strawberry, star fruit and green grape sweetness on the palate, with delicate florals gradually emerging behind it.