Bufcoffee

Under BUFCOFFEE, Epiphanie constructed a coffee washing station, at Remera (District of Nyamagabe, sector of Gasaka) as a way to improve the quality of coffee by shifting from producing commercial coffee to speciality coffee. Epiphanie aimed at adding value to herproduced coffee in order to secure for higher and stable prices. She was the first woman in Rwanda to produce speciality coffee. Bufcoffee not only raised the livelihoodsofEpiphanie's family, but also, improved those of their neighbour farmers and other people in the village. Bufcoffee started to procure coffee cherries from other neighbour farmers,and also creating employments for people in the community. Moreover, it assisted rural community to bring electricity and safe water to the village. In 2005, Bufcoffee constructed the second coffee washing station at Nyarusiza (District of Nyamagabe, sector of Kamegeri). As the business was growing, in 2010, it was reregistered as a Limited company, where Epiphaniedistributed 20 % of the shares to her children. Until 2010, Bufcoffee was renting a drying mill machine for coffee beans dehulling. In 2011, Bufcoffeebuilt its drying mill to minimize production and transaction costs. Bufcoffee, which was serving less than 500 farmers in 2003, is now procuring coffee cherries from almost 7000 smallholder farmersfrom Nyamagabeand Huyedistricts. These farmers and Bufcoffee employees are currently being trained on the importance of adopting sustainable agriculture practices (SAP). Adopting SAP will allow Bufcoffeeand its partner coffee farmers to be Rainforest certified, which will allow them to sell coffee in higher value markets at higher and stable prices. Due to its exceptional coffee quality, Bufcoffee was awarded in 2007, with the Golden Cup; and in 2008, 2010, 2011, 2013, and 2014 respectively with the Cup of Excellence. Its coffee is, now, appreciated by different buyers across the world for its uniquenessorange fruits (i.e. mandarin, nectarine, tangerine, apricot,etc.) flavours. In 2003 Bufcoffee had one buyer from USA. By 2015, Bufcoffee had several coffeebuyers from different countries, across the world, such as, Australia, Norway, Japan, UK, andUSA. In this year (2016), Bufcoffee is launching a construction project of a coffee warehouse, and a coffee roasting plant. These facilities will allow Bufcoffee to add value to coffee, and expand its market by selling roasted coffee in domestic and regional markets. BUF is an acronym which derives from the name of BUFUNDO. The latter is the region where this family was living and farming coffee.