Heres what Karst Organics the importers of this coffee have to say about it.

Overview of Timor-Leste (East Timor) 

Situated in South East Asia with Australia to the South, Timor-Leste holds the unenviable accolade of being one of the few countries in the world to have been both colonised and annexed; colonised by Portugal from 1600s to 1975 and annexed by Indonesia from 1975 to 1999. Having finally gained independence in 2002, Timor-Leste is the world’s second youngest nation state and still finding its feet in the geo-political world of the 21st century. Coffee was introduced to the island by the Portuguese and went on to become the country’s leading export by the 1900s, however the industry suffered greatly during the years of Indonesian annexation when the sector was largely ignored. Fast forward to the present day and you will see that the coffee farmers of Timor-Leste are working hard to collectively carve out a place for Timorese coffee in the global speciality coffee market. Timorese coffee is truly wild and organically grown underneath the imposing shade trees that dominate the landscape. With time old traditions in processing coffee, passed on from generation to generation, coffee is helping to build up more opportunities for Timorese people to create a consistent and sustainable income from which to support and provide for their families and the local community. Having worked together with the members of the Rotutu group since 2018, we have established a long standing partnership based on the common goal of producing high quality speciality coffee. With an extended wet season presenting challenging drying conditions at the start of this year’s harvest, Francisco de Deus (lead farmer of the Rotutu group) who always has quality at the forefront of his work, was quick to propose changes to be made at our processing facility, to aid more effective drying of the coffee. Together with our team of 7 locally employed staff, we were able to build portable drying racks which could be laid out in the sun or moved under shelter and stacked on top of each other, to allow continued ventilation and drying of the parchment. With steady year on year improvements in the quality of the coffee being processed at our facility, we are extremely appreciative of the work which our partner farmers and processing team are doing. Reflective of this and per our commitment to them, we increased our prices again this year, enabling our partner farmers to further increase their earning potential and provide a more consistent and sustainable income in which to support their families and the local community. Continued QC checks throughout processing, has ensured that this year’s coffee, despite the impact of climate change, has enabled us to maintain Rotutu’s delicious flavour profile. We are also proud that our staff continue to share their knowledge and experience with other groups in Letefoho such as Cristo Liurai and Samoro, to find solutions to problems such as the challenging drying conditions that this year’s harvest presented.

• Despatched next working day
• We use recyclable & CO2 neutral packaging
• Roasted fresh every working day
• Free next day shipping when you spend over £30
• Free two day shipping when you spend over £25