Telila Washing Station - Jimma, Ethiopia

Jimma, Ethiopia

STATION OWNER
Mike Mamo
ELEVATION
1,780 m.a.s.l.
RELATIONSHIP SINCE
2020

Telila sits near Kecho Anderacha in the Gera woreda of Jimma, between 1,780 and 2,000 metres, surrounded by forest and smallholder plots in Ethiopia's green south-west. Mike Mamo bought the washing station in 2019, processed his first harvest there that season, and has spent every year since making it one of the fussiest stations in the region.

Jimma's turn

Jimma is one of Ethiopia's oldest coffee heartlands, but for a long time it didn't carry the name of Yirgacheffe or Sidama. Most of its coffee was sold as sun-dried naturals, often at low prices. That started to change around 2010, when TechnoServe's Coffee Initiative helped farmers around Jimma form cooperatives and build wet mills, and washed Jimma coffee began turning up on specialty cupping tables.

Washed processing takes far more water, equipment and money than drying cherry in the sun, so for years it was mostly the work of cooperatives and larger private stations. Then came the 2017 reforms, which made it possible for small, traceable lots to be exported directly instead of disappearing into the Ethiopia Commodity Exchange. Two years later, Mike bought Telila.

Mike Mamo

Mike grew up around the coffee trade in Addis Ababa. He now runs Addis Exporter, the milling and exporting business his father founded, and he's a partner in Osito, the importer that brings Telila's coffee to roasters like us. Owning a washing station means he can look after quality from the moment cherry arrives at the gate.

How Telila processes coffee

Like most Ethiopian washing stations, Telila buys cherry from the smallholders around it. What happens next is where it differs. Ripe cherry is floated to weed out anything underripe or damaged. For washed lots, it's then pulped and fermented for around 24 hours in tile-lined tanks. After washing, the parchment dries slowly on raised beds for 18 to 20 days, turned constantly so it dries evenly. Finally it's sealed into Ecotact hermetic bags, a step that's still rare in Ethiopia and helps keep the coffee in good shape between drying and shipping.

Washed coffee is the backbone, but Telila also produces naturals, honeys and some anaerobic naturals.

Separated by village, and by day

Most Ethiopian washing stations blend everything that comes through the gate and sell it under the station's name. Telila keeps cherry separate by kebele, Ethiopia's smallest administrative area (roughly a village and its surrounding farms), and often by delivery day too. That's why you'll see names like Yukro, Genji Challa and Kecho Anderacha on Telila coffees. Each one is a lot from a single village, and sometimes a single day's picking. Under the old Commodity Exchange system, that detail was lost.

The trees

Most of the coffee around Telila is JARC 74110 and 74112, also known as Gibirinna and Serto. Ethiopian coffee is often labelled "heirloom", but many of the trees are selections made by the Jimma Agricultural Research Center, which is headquartered in Jimma and runs a sub-centre in Gera itself. Both began as single mother trees in the Metu-Bishari forest of neighbouring Illubabor, picked out in 1974 after coffee berry disease started tearing through Ethiopia's crop. They were released to farmers in 1979 for their resistance and reliable yields, and they're now among the most widely grown coffees in the south-west. Our guide to Ethiopian landraces untangles the whole heirloom, landrace and JARC puzzle.

Beyond the cup

Osito puts 10 cents from every pound of Telila coffee it sells towards projects at Kacho Tulla Primary School, near the station. Addis Exporter, Telila and the school's leadership manage the fund together.

Our coffees from Telila

We've been buying from Telila since 2020. The first lot that stopped us on the cupping table came from Yukro, and we bought it for several harvests after. Last Christmas, Genji Challa was our Festive Single Origin. This Christmas, Yukro is.