Coffee of the survivors of Nyamukubi (part 1)
26-12-2024Written by Merveille Kakule Saliboko, communications consultant
In May 2023, the territory of Kalehe, east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, was hit hard by the natural disaster at Nyamukubi. The hardest hit was the Kalehe Arabica Coffee Cooperative, KACCO, which produces specialty arabica coffee and is supported by AGRITERRA as part of the TRIDE project, Transition for Inclusive Development in Eastern DRC. Thanks to the efforts of this project, funded by the Kingdom of the Netherlands, KACCO's member coffee growers are recovering from the horrors of the disaster, a year and a half on.
4 May 2023 in Nyamukubi, Kalehe territory, South Kivu province, east of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Rain falls on the village of Bushushu, of which Nyamukubi is a sub-village. The aftermath was catastrophic. ‘More than 5,000 people died here in Kalehe, including several members of the cooperative on 04 May 2023’, says Pascal Mulomeodherwa Mulimbanya, managing director of the cooperative. Pascal has been Managing Director of Kalehe Arabica Coffee Cooperative, KACCO, since the cooperative was founded on 7 December 2013. The cooperative has 3,880 members. It is located in the DRC, in South Kivu, in the Kalehe territory.
Pascal Mulomeodherwa Mulimbanya, managing director of KACCO
The cooperative has experienced many difficulties. The biggest of these was the disaster on 4 May 2023, which affected more than 385 members of the cooperative. Pascal explains: ‘Before the disaster, we had 450 members at Bushushu. After the disaster, we managed to get 135 people to join after raising awareness. As a result, we now have 275 members in Nyamukubi alone'.
Several members were affected by the disaster
Neema Mwakalembe, 25, has been growing coffee for around ten years. Before the disaster, she had a field of 125 Arabica coffee plants in Nyamukubi, a field that was affected by the disaster. Today, she no longer has a field. ‘The disaster swept away my house. My husband died in the disaster. So did several of my children. I gave birth to 7 children, and of those 7, I only have 2 left’, says this coffee farmer, who has been growing coffee for around ten years. Coffee is something she learned at a very early age in her family. Today, Neema lives in one of the camps for displaced people built on a steep slope facing Lake Kivu.
Neema Mwakalembe was affected by the disaster
Minani Nyakashero Henri, 47, has been a member of the KACCO cooperative since 2014. ‘I produce my cherry coffee and then take it to KACCO for centralized processing. After it's sold by KACCO, the cooperative gives me an incentive bonus when it has made a profit. This bonus is to enable me to continue with the agronomic practices in my field’, he describes as normal. Then comes his account of the disaster: ‘I lost my sisters and some of their children. Several members of the cooperative lost their lives in the disaster here in Nyamukubi. We have lost so many women, men, and children in this disaster’.
Minani Nyakashero Henri, member of KACCO since 2014
Alphonsine, a mother of 10, is not indifferent to the situation. ‘I was hit hard by the disaster. Most of my fields had been washed away, as well as my houses. Not to mention my children. I had a son who died, he, his wife, and his two children too. I had manioc in my fields’, she explains. ‘Everything I had was gone. We're starting from scratch. It's thanks to the coffee here that my two children who are at secondary school have just finished the school year. The income from the coffee helped pay the school fees’, continues Alphonsine. Unlike Neema, Alphonsine lives with a host family ‘so that she can continue growing coffee’. She has just planted 200 more coffee plants. Before, she says, she used to produce up to 3 tonnes a season. After the disaster, she managed to produce one and a half tonnes.
Alphonsine was also hit hard by the disaster
Starting life all over again
‘Before the disaster, I was living peacefully because I had my coffee field with enough coffee plants. But the disaster wiped out everything. The disaster left us orphans and widows. It's distressing’, says Neema. It's a situation that affects many people here.
Alphonsine agrees: Before the disaster, life was better. I used to earn money in different ways. You go and harvest coffee, you get money. You go and work in the fields, you get money. You trade, you earn money. Since then, everything has changed. The disaster took the lives of many men and women. Widows and orphans have become numerous. Life has become difficult. Feeding these children and getting them back to school has become difficult’.
‘Despite the disaster, life is gradually returning to normal. Especially with the growing of coffee here’, says Henri. ‘Before the disaster at this Nyamukubi station, which we have dedicated to the surviving women, the cooperative produced more than two containers of coffee’, says the cooperative's managing director. And for the members of KACCO, getting back to life means growing coffee, a perennial crop. KACCO members can count on various forms of support from Agriterra to help them improve the quality and quantity of Congolese coffee.
G20
As part of its working methodology, Agriterra sets up groups of 20 farmers, G20, within the cooperatives to learn about good farming practices. The training courses are then scaled up. Each G20 is structured around an agrilead, a sort of model farmer. This model farmer, whose practices are more advanced than those of other farmers, receives close monitoring from a cooperative agronomist. The agronomist's salary is co-financed by Agriterra and the cooperative in decreasing amounts until the cooperative can cover the salary in full. The agrilead thus monitored in turn the fields of the members of his group.
Neema is one of the agrileads in the KACCO cooperative. ‘We're already sufficiently well organised. The group is growing. Thanks to the training we have received from Agriterra’, says the agrilead, before continuing: ’As an agrilead, I have passed on the knowledge I have gained to other women. That's how several other women agreed to follow in our footsteps and let's work together to grow coffee’.
Wondering how cooperative members are doing now?
Read part 2 of this story
Watch the video to see how coffee is changing lives
