Kenya - We have received our first micro-lot from the Rioki Farm, in the Kiambu district. It is the perfect replacement for our Karogoto. It is equally lively and jam packed with blackberry. Interestingly enough, it seems that this year the best Kenyans are coming from this district, unlike the previous years, when Nyeri dominated. Kiambu, like Nyeri, is one of the 5 districts that form the great crescent region which starts north from the city of Nairobi and then veers east just below towering Mt. Kenya. We have just purchased two more micro-lots from coops in Kiambu. These should arrive in about 2 months.

Ethiopia - We have just found an extraordinary organic Yirgacheffe which we are taking extra steps to successfully import without losing any of its power. This is no easy task. Year after year, we have found great coffees in Ethiopia only to watch them wither like raindrops over the desert, before reaching our coast due to poor handling and packaging. Terroir is pioneering the effort to revolutionize this commodity oriented aspect of coffee that so negatively effects what we are trying to achieve. Sadly, we may run out of our current batch around the end of this month and may be out of stock throughout the month of May. This new crop, however, should be more than worth the wait. Keep your fingers crossed!

Kenya - The new buying season has begun and we have cupped and ordered our first lot, very small, from the Rioki Estate in the Kiambu district. This outstanding lot should reach our shores in early May. In the meantime, we are excitedly anticipating more samples from other small, high-quality Kenyan farms. Unlike other coffee-growing nations, Kenya has an auction system where lots of coffees are freely bid on. This leads to higher prices, but also to qualities that other countries can only dream about, with few exceptions.

Rwanda - It has been the buying season for new crop Rwanda coffees but, so far, we have been disappointed by the quality of the samples we’ve received and have rejected every Rwanda coffee we have cupped this year. They have all been decent, but fundamentally variations of generic coffee, a far cry from the extraordinarily refined and aromatic Rwanda we still have from last year. Unlike larger roasters with little flexibility to maneuver, Terroir Coffee will only carry what meets exceptional cup standards and we won’t have a new Rwandan coffee unless we find one that exceeds our expectations. We are hoping that the next samples do precisely that.

George’s Trip to Guatemala. George recently visited the El Injerto and Providencia farms in Guatemala’s Huehuetenango region and will be sharing his photos and experiences online soon. Check www.terroircoffee.com in the next few days for his postings.

Drought in Kenya. Due to a widespread drought in Kenya, 3.5 million people face starvation, a crisis that might become the worst in 4 decades according to Oxfam. Kenyan and U.N. aid agencies have asked for $221.5 million for food (approximately 396,525 tons), needed to avoid mass starvation over the next 12 months. Many people and tens of thousands of live stock have already died from starvation and disease in the northern regions. Lack of water and food has increased violence between Kenyan farmers and herders and people from Somalia and Ethiopia. In some areas, malnutrition levels have reached 30 percent, more than double the U.N. standard for declaration of emergency. Unfortunately, nothing has been set up quite yet for donating to the Kenya relief effort, but, as always, you can donate to Oxfam. We will keep our eyes open for any Kenya relief efforts and release any information we can find on our website.