Sitting in the top-floor restaurant at the KNCU coffee co-operative’s headquarters in downtown Moshi, drinking Serengeti beers from the Banana Grove Bar, our coffee travellers enjoyed the late afternoon sun following a day of meetings and of heavy intermittent rain. We were looking out the large windows that face northwards; after four days in the area, and with our time in Moshi drawing to a close, we still sought a clear view of the monolithic peak that dominates the region and, in a broader sense, our image of Tanzania – mighty Kilimanjaro.In the wake of the rain showers the mountain had largely reappeared, but thick cloud continued to cloak its upper reaches and hid most of its higher slopes entirely. Unless we would strike it lucky on our last day, our clearest view of the mountain by the time we left would have offered us an image of its patchily-glaciated summit slopes, but not the full view that we had hoped for. Visiting the coffee co-operative that supports farmers living on Kilimanjaro’s lowest slopes, I’ve been left with much the same sensation. We’re here to learn if, and how best, we can work to support sustainable production for coffee farmers in a country notorious for the uneconomic size of its modern-day coffee farms. Due to the continual subdivision of farms as land is passed down from farmer to numerous children, plots here are becoming minute – an acre is a common size.
On this mountain, farms that produce 500kg of coffee are considered to be large, even though this is a tiny amount in comparison to that grown by small-scale farmers in most other parts of the world. But although we are paying relatively high prices for organic coffee produced by members of the KNCU fair trade co-operative, if I ask myself whether or not this can form the basis of a sustainable long term trade, the answer is not yet entirely clear.
The fortunes of the co-operative have in recent decades mirrored, to a large degree, those of Kilimanjaro’s famous glaciers. As the snows have receded, water sources further down the mountain have dried up significantly; where once 50-60 springs fed rivers and streams, today there are only around 20. Where once KNCU, a long-established co-op, dominated local trade and exported many thousands of tonnes of coffee, today that figure has dwindled considerably. The offices of the co-operative appear cavernous and empty as staff numbers have fallen by 90% in recent times, and the local processing mill owned by the co-op is largely a shell; the sacks of coffee awaiting hulling inside it occupy a tiny corner of the massive warehouse space available.
The average age of farmers here is increasing – it’s around 50 – and coffee trees are aging too; many of the trees are also at least 50 years old and their production is in steady decline.
At the same time, we know that there are a number of passionate younger farmers here who wish to continue growing coffee, and they know what it takes to produce high quality beans. We also know that organic production here could grow substantially, that there is a good market for Tanzanian organic coffee, and that a significant number of farmers can reasonably expect to get better returns by converting to organic production. Also, many farmers here are aware of the substantial health cost that has been paid through the use of toxic chemical insecticides and fungicides, and they don’t wish to repeat the mistakes of the past where spraying left them feeling physically sick, killed some of their relatives and caused their cows to miscarry.
The challenge for us largely lies ahead; can we support a trade in coffee that will help to preserve the industry in this country or, like the glaciers that still glisten thousands of meters above us, will it continue to dwindle until, sooner or later, it eventually disappears? Already farmers here have largely diversified out of coffee production; they enjoy the reliability of the income that their coffee harvest can provide, but with only 60-70kg of coffee produced per farm they need to earn additional money from other crops, from the sale of reared livestock, and from other paid employment. If Kilimanjaro is to retain its reputation as an important coffee producing region, farmers will need strong incentives to plant new trees on its broad, shaded slopes.
There is evidence that, with KNCU selling coffee under fair trade terms in recent years, higher stable prices from fair trade buyers is helping to motivate farmers to do this – and we hope that the trend can continue.
