Co-op members generally share 70 percent of the profits among themselves and reinvest the remainder in the co-op for management, marketing, equipment, training and other expenses. Co-op members are able to sell directly to the roaster, cutting out brokers and wholesalers, and learn about buying, selling and bookkeeping in the process.
Co-ops also provide their members with social support. “After the genocide, I feared other people’s reaction when they got to know that my husband is in jail, so it was not easy to join the co-op,” said Gemma Uwera, a 53-year-old mother of eight whose husband is accused of a genocide crime. “Now I have friends, I meet regularly with widows of genocide, and we plan how we can help each other if someone has a problem.”
Christian Ruzigama, 43, left his 300-tree coffee plantation in 1994, and returned to find his house destroyed and the plantation in shambles. At the co-op’s washing station, he has become an expert in fermenting the beans. He has earned enough money to send his children to school, buy health insurance, a cow and two goats, and is planning on building a new house. At the co-op, he said, no one is focused on the past any more.
“I think the Rwandan future will be bright,” Ruzigama said. “Coffee is our new source of life.”
RSS