Kula Is: A Restoration of Soil and Earth

Our field teams across Rwanda distributed 150,000 coffee and shade trees to farmers planning to expand their farms, replace old trees, or to begin coffee farming for the first time.  In what has become a pillar of our annual calendar, these trees were given to farmers in our Fellowship Program, but also to hundreds more in the districts where we work, to grow the coffee sector overall.  A seemingly simple act, providing these trees reflects anything but.  It’s just one step in the year-round process for our teams in seedling production, and just one step in the life-long process of farmers steadily looking for ways to support and strengthen their livelihood.  

We have big goals for the number of trees we hope to distribute in the coming years, and with each annual cycle we learn more about the best ways to move forward.  There is much ground work needed in every season; identifying the best cherries, selecting the best seed, understanding the right time for each action, building healthy nurseries, and mobilizing farmers who are serious about the health and future of their farms.  But the impact is real, as we are seeing old and under-producing farms revitalized with new cultivation, farmers eager to expand and improve their production, and regions which weren’t coffee focused in the past now turning out sizable, high quality harvests.  As this year’s distribution approaches, we mark another celebration of this growth, of everything in the past year that’s brought us here and of all the potential seen by farmers in each new tree.         

A huge and continuous thanks to One Tree Planted for financially partnering with us in the preparation and distribution of these trees, and for all their work around the globe.