Burundi - Turihamwe

Turihamwe is a women-led initiative, built and owned by a group of seven entrepreneurial coffee farmers who pooled their savings, now involving more than 2000 smallholders in the area earned through quality premiums from JNP Coffee, to create Burundi’s first woman-owned wet mill. When they began, there wasn’t even a road to the site. Undeterred, they built one themselves. With support from JNP Coffee and their own investment group, these women turned a dream into a thriving business. Since its founding in 2019, Turihamwe has grown from producing five micro-lots to 1,200 bags of coffee per year, all while maintaining a focus on quality and sustainability.

Turihamwe specializes in the fully washed process, the process begins with mechanical removal of the pulp, followed by overnight fermentation under water to remove the mucilage. The beans are then sorted by density in channels, soaked, and finally dried on raised African beds. At the station most of the drying is shaded and in open air, and using pyramid-style arrangements to ensure slow, even drying over 15 to 20 days.

The station’s design includes tiled fermentation tanks, which are easier to clean and help maintain the purity of the coffee. Water used in processing is filtered before being returned to the river, a practice that reflects the group’s commitment to environmental stewardship. Fertilizer use is minimal due to cost, making the coffee organically grown by default, nourished by the region’s rich volcanic soils.