The region around the Great Lakes of Central Africa — Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Tanzania, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo — is better known for its history of conflict than coffee. However, these countries are traditional coffee-producing lands that have emerged as a vital source of high-end coffee in the last ten years. The potential advantages of the Great Lakes region producing fair coffee are a direct consequence of hard-working farmers, high-growing elevation, volcanic soil, and the temperature-moderating influence of the region’s freshwater lakes.
DUKUNDEKAWA is a fair trade certified cooperative created in 2000. The cooperative regroups 1,409 coffee producers across ten sectors of Musasa. As for many producers in the region, quality is critical to access the market. To reach the standards, the cooperative received assistance to build washing stations and using technical tools. The farmers of DUKEUDEKAWA received an award for their discipline and hard work, the cup of excellence of Rwanda in 2008, 2010, 2011 and 2012.
The Trade for Development Centre assisted DUKUNDEKAWA through coaching in marketing and €46,400 of financial support between January and December 2017. The goal of the assistance was to contribute to a steady stream of revenue by improving market access and reinforcing the organisational capacity in marketing, communication and sales.
The coaching was organised in two phases:
1. Tailor-made training that aimed at strengthening their candidature for the full coaching in marketing. That training covered the analysis of key figures and marketing data about the organisation while analysing the environment to outline threats, opportunities, strengths and weaknesses.
2. Tailor-made coaching on marketing strategies by covering market analysis (internal/external), strategy definitions, target market identification, choice of marketing, promotion, communications, and new consumer prospection
All the coaching was carried out in three modules over two years.
