For our Rocko Mountain this year from Falcon Specialty, with the help of their team in Addis they have been sourcing this particular coffee that truly represents the old school traditional flavour of Yirgacheffe. That
is why these year with the support of Siz Agro we have been able to connect directly to Tariku and source this magnificent natural processed coffee. Tariku Mengesha is the sole owner and produced this natural coffee entirely on his farms, the farm is located throughout the Banko Chelchele kebele (neighbourhood) of Gedeb woreda, south of Yirgacheffe and just west of the border with the vast Oromia region. Tariku applied the basic agronomic practices and keep the field free of any weeds, grows pulse crops in his coffee field so as to maintain the fertility of the soil. The pruning practices are carried out with the technical help from our Stumping Project partners, Technoserve, and some district Agricultural experts. Tariku processes the coffee with the help of Tesfaye Roba, and this lot has been processed as a traditional Natural, first by soaking the cherries to remove all immature, floaters, overripe and foreign matter and then drying on raised beds for 28 days. While coffee is Tariku's primary income, which he uses to support his family that includes 10 children (3 boys and 7 girls), he also grows navy beans and false banana, called “enset,” which produce no edible fruit but whose root and heart ( rhizome and pseudostem, if you want to be botanically accurate) can be harvested.