Description:

Ethiopia is the birthplace of coffee, and coffee seeds and saplings go to all over the world through the port of Mocha. Comparing to neighboring Kenya, beans in Ethiopia generally vary in size and have significantly lower uniformity. Whether it is Yirgacheffe or Sidamo, washed or natural, sometimes when you observe the same batch of coffee beans, you can find that the roasted color and particle size are obviously different. This is because coffee beans vary in size due to their wide variety and intensive processing.

In addition to the diversity of varieties, coffee cultivation has also influenced the complexity of Ethiopian beans. Most of the coffee cultivation in Sidamo and Yirgacheffe belongs to the pastoral coffee model, that is, coffee farmers plant coffee trees near their living areas, harvest them by themselves during the harvest season, and then send them to nearby treatment plants built on water sources for central processing (or purchased uniformly by an intermediary). Except for a small number of relatively powerful planting estates that independently grow, pick, and process green coffee beans, many coffee beans from different regions and varieties are centrally processed by processing plants and then sent to auction houses for official evaluation and grading.

This is the reason why many Ethiopian coffee beans are named after processing plants or cooperatives. It is also one of the reasons why the same batch of coffee beans are mixed with multiple coffee varieties, and even the same processing plant produces different batches of coffee beans. There will also be obvious differences in flavor between them.

Ana Sora is a single coffee estate in Ethiopia, located in the Guji production area. The owner of the estate, Israel Defga, is a second generation operator. Established in 2010, the estate has 250 hectares of land area, of which 150 hectares are used for coffee cultivation, with an average altitude of 1,900 to 2,350 meters. Recently, an additional 100 hectares have been expanded to cultivate coffee. The abundant water sources along the Turo River have been used to establish a washing station to produce washed beans. Ana Sora also funds nearby orphanages and provides higher-level educational villages, hoping to give back to the local area so that they can have a better life. The rise of Guji is one of the several important development trends in Ethiopia in recent years. Shakisso is a familiar example, but Ana Sora's operation model can be said to be unique.