The Kopakama Coffee Cooperative was started in 1998, just after the devastating Rwandan genocide that left so many widows and orphaned children. We are proud to create cooperative coffee in Rwanda.
Kopakama Cooperative is in Rutsiro in Western province, Rwanda. Coffee has been grown here for decades. But without infrastructure and limited access to markets, it was only sold locally, fetching basic prices and providing a low and unreliable income for the farmers’ hard work and effort.
Yet this beautiful part of Rwanda has perfect conditions for growing high-quality, specialty coffee that can rightfully attract premium prices.
We knew that we had the right environment for producing fine coffee. But it was not something that could be done by individual farmers. We needed the power of numbers and scale.
Kopakama Coffee Cooperative started with just 47 smallholder coffee farmers, generating a larger scale and the ability to invest in infrastructure such as drying mills. It also allowed us to share best practices in farming, sustainability, and agronomy. Read more about our sustainability at Kopakama.
20 years later, Kopakama is a cooperative with a proud 1,090 coffee farming members, including 470 women. We have our own dry mill and two washing stations.
In 2011, our all-women sub-cooperative, Ejo Heza, was established. This exceptional coffee combines our aims to create world-class coffee and empower Rwandan women farmers. Read more about Ejo Heza coffee [LINK Ejo Heza].
In 2013, we voted for our first female cooperative president, Marthe Uwiherwenimana. Kopakama cooperative draws on over 20 years’ industry experience, with established infrastructure and governance, and a long, reliable, and trusted export history.
We currently export to the US, UK, Switzerland, Japan, China, and Australia. We are always looking for new partnerships to share our delicious, award-winning Rwandan coffee.
Our focus is on producing the very best quality coffee that Rwanda has to offer, with absolute consistency. We work hard to ensure our farmers follow best practices and share skills and knowledge.
We are proud to have achieved Fair Trade, Rainforest Alliance, and Organic certifications. And our cupping scores of 86-89 attest to our attention to every detail in our coffee production.
Our vision is to expand the market with more exports, building a truly sustainable coffee industry in Rwanda. We want to continue to improve the lives of our cooperative members, through exquisite, fine Rwandan Arabica coffee.
