Route development
It took one year to develop a regular import route. There were two major walls. Logistics and remittances. The Rwandan experience helped us in logistics. At first, it was transported to a bonded warehouse in Rwanda and then airlifted from Kigali airport. Later, I noticed that the plane from Kigali also departed from Goma. Currently, it is being airlifted from Goma to Narita.
Kivu Province, where it is produced, is a travel prohibited area in Japan because it is a conflict area. Bank remittances to that area were a very high barrier because "there is a risk of becoming a source of funds for terrorism." However, a local bank (Joyo Bank) made a bank transfer to the Goma branch.
This has the by-product of the DRC being a safe and secure country where bank transfers are accepted.
SCPNCK
The partner is the SCPNCK association, which has more than 20 flushing plants on Koh Ijui in Lake Kivu.
We are learning about specialty coffee from USAID and others, and we are producing high-quality specialty beans (KIVU3). Although it is a small amount, it seems that it is also shipped to Europe and the United States.
You have to sort the good beans by hand. It is a very time-consuming process. They are doing this even in the adverse environment of a travel no-go zone.
* Specialty coffee: 5% market, beans selected by U.S. standards of 80 points or more
Until then, it seems that there was no export by its own export procedure. We worked together to figure out where and which documents to obtain so that they could be exported to Japan.
The union is Fair Trade and Organic certified.
The union has a "coffee ambassador". Coffee ambassadors will guide you on how to harvest and taste. All of our coffee ambassadors are women. Women are the leaders of the company and are working on making good coffee.
DRC coffee is still rare. I hope that it will become more and more known to the world in the future.