Mitondo coffee factory

Kenya

Bio

Mitondo coffee factory was started in 1966 by a few farmers. It is part of Mwirua farmers cooperative society which manages a total of 9 factories/wetmills and was established in 1954. Small scale farmers pool their coffee cherry (raw coffee) to the factory for wet processing which is then delivered to commercial millers and marketers for milling and marketing respectively. After sales are concluded, it is the societys function to distribute the payments to the members on per production per member basis. The strength of the society lies with numbers which means processing costs per kilo delivered is usually lower when processing is done at the factory/society level than at individual level. This greatly improves economies of scale and enables farmers to access other resources such as agronomy advice, marketing consultancy and certification schemes at a favourable rate.