Gakenke has a beautifully rich history surrounding the hospitality and sharing nature of the Burundian people. The washing station managed by Gratien Nankwahombaye employs nearly 2,700 farmers around the hills of the city of Gatare. Each farmer has 1-2 ha with 250 trees of Red Bourbon on average per ha picked by hand. Quality assurance begins as soon as farmers deliver their cherries.

Burundi has long been overlooked in comparison to its neighboring East African specialty coffee producing powerhouses. The country’s coffee is produced almost entirely by smallholder farmers, and much of this small-scale production is of exceptional quality.

With distinctive sweet, clean and often floral coffees, Burundi, every year, is increasingly is putting itself on the specialty coffee map.

Building washing stations and expanding agricultural extension work can be great ways to improve coffee quality. Washing stations are pivotal in improving cup profile standards and the global reputation of Burundian coffee.

Gakenke has a beautifully rich history surrounding the hospitality and sharing nature of the Burundian people, as well as their love for their home brewed beers. The region, like most, is home to quite an abundance of banana trees and so, the abundance of trees brings with it, an abundance of urwawa. The consumption of urwawa was done so using a clay pot called “intango” and small straws called “imikenke” (where the name of Gakenke comes from).

Now, back in the day, the Burundian people only worked in the mornings as the afternoons were a time for socializing and gathering as neighbours. A member of the community was selected for a particular day and it was their responsibility and pleasure to host and brew for the community in a time where all came together to drink, socialize and make merry.

Gakenke station was built in 1991. With 224 drying beds, the station can process up to 750 metric tons per season. The station has 2 flotation tanks, 10 fermentation tanks, and 2 soaking tanks. The drying field has 150 raised beds.

Gakenke station spread over 22 hills in Gatare commune, Kayanza province. These are organized in groups of 30 people, headed by a producer leader to facilitate communication and organization with the washing station.

The washing station participates in a number of farmer outreach and support projects including a livestock rearing project and a range of Farmer Hub projects centered on strengthening cooperatives and improving yields.

All coffee trees in Burundi are Red Bourbon, which is tightly controlled by the government for reasons of quality. Because of theincreasingly small size of coffee plantings, aging rootstock is a very big issue in Burundi.

Many farmers have trees that are over 50 years old, but with small plots to farm, it is difficult to justify taking trees entirely out of production for the 3-4 years it will take new plantings to begin to yield. Despite the ubiquity of coffee growing in Burundi, each smallholder produces a relatively small harvest. The average smallholder has approximately 250 trees, normally in their backyards. Each tree yields an average of 1.5 kilos of cherry so theaverage producer sells about 200-300 kilos of cherry annually.