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Cows for quality coffee at COOPAC
Every year, Rwanda's national coffee competition awards the country's best coffee with the prestigious "Cup of Excellence." This year, farmers from Coop Coffees' producer partner COOPAC received fantastic scores and collected enough money from the coffees' auction sales to purchase several cows, goats, and hoes for the winning groups!
The international gourmet coffee authority, the Alliance for Coffee Excellence recently hosted the annual Cup of Excellence Rwanda Program in collaboration with the Coffee Development Authority of Rwanda (OCIR CAFÉ). To be able to participate, the entered coffees had to score above 84 points on the SCAA scale. From the 250 coffee producer participants, the COE selected the highest scoring coffees (of 2008).
Among the 24 winners who were selected, three of the lots of Coop Coffees' producer partner COOPAC – specifically from the washing stations of Kabirizi, Nyamwenda, and Kirorero – received scores of 88.07%, 86.26% and 84.48% respectively. Following the competition, the Alliance for Coffee Excellence put the coffees up for auction online and these very lots were sold for nearly $7 per pound! The revenue from the sale was used to purchase 53 dairy cows which will be distributed among COOPAC’s members. COOPAC hopes that the animal prizes will not only encourage farmers to strive for higher quality but also to diversify their income through milk sales and incorporate the cows' manure into organic fertilizer.
During the cow distribution ceremony, COOPAC also awarded 103 goats and 685 hoes to farmers who turned in the best quality coffee in 2009. The winners were selected from the washing stations that produced the top quality coffee based on the identification forms and the quantity that each farmer contributed. None of the farmers knew prior to the ceremony that they’d be awarded for their hard work – the animal prizes were an added bonus to the quantity premiums they had already received at the time of the collection. | The Minister of Agriculture |
