LCC Roastery

The African Great Lakes are a series of lakes constituting the part of the Rift Valley lakes in and around the East African Rift. They include Lake Victoria, the second-largest fresh water lake in the world by area, Lake Tanganyika, the world’s second-largest freshwater lake by volume and depth, and Lake Malawi, the world’s eighth-largest fresh water lake by area. Collectively, they contain 31,000 km3 of water, which is more than either Lake Baikal in Russia or the North American Great Lakes. This total constitutes about 25% of the planet’s unfrozen surface fresh water. This area is famous of its biodiversity, but equally famous of conflicts and civil wars.

The countries whose coffee regions nestle around the Great Lakes of Central Africa—Rwanda, Burundi, and key growing areas of Uganda, Tanzania, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo—make appearances in the news cycle more often for conflict than for coffee. But these countries are also longtime coffee-producing lands that have, within the last 10 years or so, emerged as important sources of distinctive high-end specialty coffees.

For those familiar with the extraordinarily difficult history of this region, the recent, widespread conversion from commodity coffee—usually carelessly harvested and dried—to carefully managed, high-quality, high-value specialty production, may appear miraculous. The historical challenges for farmers have been daunting: little technical agricultural support and training; lack of capital; abysmally low coffee prices; weakness of overall infrastructure, and, in some cases, brutal civil conflicts that have often stretched over years, even decades.

Yet the potential advantages of these regions for producing fine coffee are equally profound: hard-working farmers, relatively high growing elevations, volcanic soil, and in some cases the temperature-moderating influence of the region’s enormous fresh-water lakes. Lake Victoria in Uganda is the world’s third-largest freshwater lake by area, and Lake Tanganyika, bordering Burundi and Tanzania, is the second-largest by volume. Lake Kivu is considerably smaller, but still a very large lake, and directly proximate to key growing regions in both Rwanda and Congo.

Nyamasheke and Kayanza region of Rwanda and Burundi respectively have already gained their reputation in the Speciality coffee world (LCC Roastery has standing offering from these 2 regions all year). This month, we select three coffees from Congo Kivu region, Uganda Mt.Elgon and Tanzania Ruvuma region to expand our understanding of coffee growing in this African Great Lakes area. These are the area worth pay more attention and in need for our support, just like Rwanda and Burundi 10 years ago.

• Congo Kivu Org. SOPACDI – Pygmies’ Coffee Project – Bourbon Washed Processed 
• Uganda Mt Elgon Mbale – Lutheran World Relief 
• Tanzanian Premium Ruvuma – Sepukila AA – Top Lot