Sidamo is the largest coffee growing region of Ethiopia, in part because the Ethiopian Commodities Exchange (ECX) uses a fairly broad definition to identify Sidamo coffee. Expanding beyond the politically designated border of Sidama, regions from Nensebo woreda in the west to the Konta region in the east are all classified as Sidamo coffees. The ECX divides Sidamo into 5 geographical areas as Sidamo A to E. These letters do not represent quality grades, but are important geographic designations that particular profiles and levels of objective quality are often associated with. The politically defined Sidama zone hosts a population of about 3.5 million people who speak the Cushidic language Sidamigna, and celebrate their own New Year known as "Fiche Chembelala".
Sourcing coffee in Ethiopia can be quite challenging, due to the opaque nature of governmental policies and oversight over the country's largest export. The key to consistent quality and some level of traceability are relationships with central washing stations. Lots from Sidamo are comprised of the work of hundreds of individual farmers, all harvesting wild growing local landraces and delivering cherry to these central stations to be processed using the traditional washed method or sun-dried in the fruit on raised beds. The uniformity in this process delivers a certain regional profile of relative consistency, despite the dozens of unclassified varietals and individual farming practices which go into their cultivation. Our merchant partners working in Ethiopia have developed strong relationships with these regional processing sites, their leadership, and a network of exporters whole help navigate the byzantine nature the ECX and their trade policies. It is for they reason that they are able to source, separate, and track the movement of coffee through the supply chain and deliver the unique coffees we know and love year after year.
