Suke Quto

Tesfaye Bekele founded Suke Quto in 2000 in the aftermath of a series of wildfires in the forests of Guji, Ethiopia. At the time, he was working for Ethiopia's national forestry service. Witnessing residents of the area replanting razed forestland with monoculture crops like corn and teff, he began campaigning for coffee as an alternative - a native species that could be cultivated as a cash crop but still grown under forest cover. Initially Tesfaye's efforts were met with reluctance. At the time Guji was known for its mineral resources and for livestock herding but it was not a well established region for coffee production, and given that newly planted coffee requires several years to become productive, it was not seen by locals as a well-proven investment. Understanding this, Tesfaye quit his job with the forestry service and started a demonstration farm, a plant nursery, and two washing stations to encourage farmers in the area to adopt coffee agroforestry and then to support them in bringing their coffees to market...