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Coffee Tours in Uganda
Coffee Tours in Uganda: Uganda is an appealing destination for any traveler, with many features that provide guests with wonderful views and memories. Uganda is well-known as a wildlife safari destination, offering a variety of tourist activities such as cultural safari tours and game drive safaris. Sport fishing, chimp and gorilla trekking, Nile and boat cruise trips, farm tours, and beach vacation tours are just a few of the activities available. Indeed, as Church Hill describes, Uganda is a pear of Africa, with all the activities that take place.
Aside from wildlife, scenic landscape views, and a friendly population, Uganda offers an interesting tourist activity that involves traveling to coffee plantations in some regions of the country.
It is important to note that agriculture is very important in Uganda, and the majority of the people are farmers. Coffee, trees, vanilla, cocoa, millet, yams, and a variety of other cash crops are grown. To be more specific, coffee contributes 20% of Uganda’s total efforts, which amounts to approximately $50 million USD per year. This means that coffee remains a significant exporter and contributor to the Ugandan economy.
With this said, Coffee tours in Uganda are seen to be on the rise as tourists tend to love to know how coffee is planted, harvested and processed at a rural level.
Coffee cultivation in Uganda dates back to the year 1900, when it was first introduced. Initially, Ugandan coffee was primarily for export until coffee drinking became popular among locals. Since then, coffee has become one of Uganda’s most popular beverages among both locals and visitors.
The Coffee Tours in Uganda activities help to generate income for local people in the communities, allowing them to improve their standard of living. Visitors on coffee tours are usually given a small take-home gift of a coffee packet to share with their friends and family back home. The best Uganda coffee is delicious and pure, with no additives. Some people like to chew coffee beans, while others prefer to drink brewed roasted ground Ugandan coffee.
Coffee Tours in Uganda can be done as a standalone activity on your safari itinerary or in conjunction with other activities. These include a visit to a handcraft shop, weaving baskets, and a banana beer brewery experience that takes you through the process of harvesting bananas, storing them in holes to ripen, removing the peels, and turning them into juice, which is then fermented into beer by adding yeast.
Types of coffee grown in Uganda
In Uganda, two types of coffee are primarily grown: Arabica coffee, which grows on the slopes of Mount Elgon – Sipi, and Robusta coffee, which grows best in low-altitude areas of Uganda. Some local farmers also grow Nyasaland coffee which is a bit expensive on the market though it is grown on a small scale.
Coffee tours in Uganda can be taken in a variety of locations. Don’t miss Mount Elgon coffee tours to see Bugisu coffee farms, also known as Arabic coffee farms, near Sipi falls and Mbale on your Uganda safari.
The village tours around Bwindi Impenetrable National Park take you on an adventure to learn about Robusta coffee farming in Uganda. Other locations for a coffee safari in Uganda include areas near Kibale National Park and around Queen Elizabeth Park.
Coffee Tours in Mbale Region - Sipi and Mt Elgon
Mountain Elgon is a dormant volcano in east Africa that is divided or bisected by the Kenya-Uganda border. This volcanic mountain was formed as a result of volcanic activity, and Mt Elgon Uganda falls under the rain shadow, making the slopes of the mountains ideal for crop cultivation because the soils are fertile and it receives a lot of rain.
The slopes of this mountain are known to have very fertile volcanic soils. These soils are the best for the growing of coffee, Arabica coffee to be specific. The natives have taken well advantage of the soil fertility and have been growing this particular type of coffee for generations. This is one of their major economic activities. The activity has since attracted tourists who hike to these lands to learn more about the way this coffee is grown, harvested and processed in the region.
Coffee tours in Elgon – Mbale will take you to the foothills of Mount Elgon, where you will visit households and learn about the various processes that coffee goes through, from harvesting to packaging. Remember that you must plant coffee, harvest it, process it, preserve it, and buy it. You will be able to learn more about these processes from the region’s experienced local farmers.
As a visitor undertaking this coffee tour, you will have to travel for about 5 hours from Kampala to the Kapchorwa coffee growing region, which is approximately 280 kilometers from Kampala, Uganda’s capital city. When you arrive, you will be warmly greeted by a local guide who is indigenous to the area and also a coffee farmer, and he or she will share exciting experiences about coffee handling that are both rewarding and exceptional.
As mentioned before, traditionally, Arabic coffee is grown here, which thrives on fertile volcanic soils and at high altitudes of 1,600m- 1,900m. These conditions are present in the Kapachorwa, which has favoured Arabic coffee cultivation on the slopes of Mt. Elgon.
The most rewarding aspect of coffee tours in Uganda is visiting coffee farmers on a household level. As a visitor, you will help the farm owner pick ready coffee beans that are always red from the garden, sun dry them, and pound them to remove the outer layer known as the husk. Following that, coffees are roasted over a regulated fire and pound the roasted coffee to obtain powder that can be mixed with hot water and you enjoy the locally made Arabic coffee drink that you have made for yourself.
Coffee, in addition to providing income to farmers and job opportunities, contributes to the economies of other regions through the value chain. Transporters to factories and markets benefit from coffee, as do those involved in weighing and processing, as well as loaders. Coffee is now used as an ingredient in several manufacturing industries, and it is exported outside of Uganda to boost the country’s GDP.
Coffee Tours - Sipi and Mt Elgon
As Coffee Tours in Uganda travellers, you can decide to accompany your gorilla tracking adventure in Bwindi National Park with a coffee tour at a local farm in the regions of Kisoro district. The Village tours around Bwindi Impenetrable national park takes you on an experience to learn about Robusta coffee farming in Uganda. Spend the entire day with small-scale farmers in the vicinity of Bwindi Impenetrable National Park.
Here, you will learn what it takes to make a great cup of coffee: From Bean to Cup, hoe to dig, weed, and harvest organic coffee in a real farming environment during the coffee-making experience. You will participate and learn about the entire process, from seedlings to drinking. You will have the opportunity to pick, pound, roast, grind, and drink coffee. Farmers’ skills and knowledge will bring a new appreciation to your coffee drinking habits. You only take the coffee-making experience here.
Coffee tours in Queen Elizabeth National park
Coffee Tours in Queen Elizabeth National Park are a popular tourist activity because the park is surrounded by coffee farmers. Coffee tours are just one of the amazing life experiences one can have while on a Uganda safari to this park.
Coffee plantations are something unique that most people overlook when visiting Queen Elizabeth National Park. A coffee plantation is an area of extensive farming located between the game park and the farmlands of Queen Elizabeth National Park. It is technically within the buffer zone that separates the park from the farmlands.
When visiting Queen Elizabeth National Park in the west, visitors can take coffee tours. During these fascinating tours, you will learn about the entire process of growing coffee seeds, from the production stages to the market stage.
The coffee plantation within Queen Elizabeth National Park is managed by the Omwani Women’s Cooperative. Omwani Women’s Cooperative is a group of mature women who dedicate their lives to raising the living standards of their families and communities by producing organic coffee beans. Because the lands can support this exceptional natural farming method, these women grow coffee on fertile soils without using any bio-chemicals or fertilizers. In the region, there are over 1500 Arabic coffee and Robusta coffee trees.
It is therefore a good idea to pay a visit to the Omwani women while on safari in Queen Elizabeth National Park to sample the coffee planted by these women in the area. Coffee production is done by hand, and it includes stages such as growing, harvesting, sorting, drying, cleaning, secondary sorting, roasting, and packing.
Omwani Women’s Cooperative members are skilled at producing high-quality coffee, which is required globally all year. The weather has favored good production because the area has two seasons of rainfall and a cool climate, which influences the region’s good coffee growth.
The coffee plantation was established to maintain and teach the women in the communities surrounding Queen Elizabeth National Park skills such as teaching them the stages of coffee production until the packing point and getting it onto the market, as most of them are uneducated and have faced challenges such as family conflicts that have lowered their standard of living.
The coffee plantations are always open for visitors to tour and feel the coffee plants, beginning with the nursery beds where the seeds are first laid to ensure that they are well cared for before being transferred to the main section of the gardens.
Take on a coffee tour to Queen Elizabeth National park and get to learn more that can’t even be expressed by words, but can be understood at first glance.
Coffee tours in Kibale National park
While on a Uganda Safari tour to Kibale Forest national park take a visit coffee farms, particularly those producing Robusta coffee. This type of coffee is primarily grown in the Isunga community lying at the edge of the well-known chimpanzee park. The local guide will walk you through all of the gardening procedures, such as nursery time, propagation, and harvesting, among others. Then you’ll be taken to one of the homesteads to see the coffee beans being processed by hand with traditional tools like a motor and a pounding stick. After a cup of coffee, the experience comes to an end.
