Gesha Village

The story

The Gesha Village project began in 2007 when founders Rachel Samuel and Adam Overton traveled to Ethiopia to document wild coffee species. In 2011, they identified a site near the Gori Gesha forest in the Bench Maji zone to establish their own coffee estate. They have since developed the 471-hectare property from the ground up to cultivate and preserve the genetic heritage of the Gesha variety.

Challenges

The farm is located in a remote area of the Bench Maji zone, requiring the founders to build the estate from scratch in a challenging, wild environment.

Innovations

The estate utilizes a block-based management system to track production and experiment with diverse processing and fermentation techniques. They also focus on preserving genetic diversity by cultivating heirloom varieties sourced directly from expeditions to the Gori Gesha and Illubabor forests.