Gatare is one the oldest washing stations in the country, dating back in 2003. Gatare has a long reputation having been among the first stations to process very high quality coffee for export. 

Located in Nyamasheke district of the Western province, the station is surrounded by hills covered by coffee trees. Rwanda is blessed with ideal coffee growing conditions that include high altitude, regular rainfall, volcanic soils with good organic structure and an abundance of Bourbon.

The vast majority of Rwandan coffee is produced by smallholders of which there are thought to be around half a million with parcels of land often not much larger than just one hectare per family.

Mustefa Abakeno is a smallholder farmer who owns 18 hectares of land near to Agaro in the Jimma area of Western Ethiopia. The farm and wet mill is located 2040 masl and is planted with various variety selections from the Jimma research centre. Mustefa has a small disk pulper, which he uses for half of his coffee, the other half is dried as a natural. Due to a lack of water in the area and limited space to ferment the coffee, Mustefa ferments the coffee for a short period of time before he moves it to his drying beds, and the result is something like a light honey process.

Mustefa has recently registered as an exporter in order to start selling his coffee directly to buyers, which he is now able to do since the changes to regulation in Ethiopia. He has set up a small wet mill where he processes his farm’s and outgrowers’ coffee, which he keeps separate and dries on raised beds near his house. Mustefa’s outgrowers are all neighbours and have between 4 and 10 hectares of land each.