African upstart-- Zimbabwe Coffee producing area introduces the characteristics of Zimbabwe Coffee

Zimbabwe, located in southern Africa, is a landlocked country not near the sea, right next to Mozambique. Zimbabwe only began to grow coffee in the early 20th century, but it was almost wiped out by insect pests around 1920. Since 1950, with the migration of coffee farmers from India and Kenya to Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe has the knowledge and technology to produce quality coffee. It was only when farmers in southern Africa set up coffee plantations around the 1960s that they slowly began to grow them on a large scale.

Coffee from Zimbabwe may be relatively rare now, but in fact, Zimbabwe used to produce about 15000 tons of high-quality coffee beans like Brazil, Kenya and Ethiopia. At the peak of coffee production in Zimbabwe, the coffee industry employed more than 20000 people, contributed more than 2 per cent of GDP and generated foreign exchange earnings of more than US $54 million. After 2000, due to political unrest and other reasons, Zimbabwe's coffee industry fell off a cliff.

Producing area

Coffee cultivation in Zimbabwe is mainly concentrated in the eastern highlands near Mozambique, which are mainly composed of the Chimanimani Mountains and the northward Nyanga Mountains, while the Nyanga Mountains are blocked by the Inyangani Mountains.

Zimbabwe's coffee is mainly produced in the provinces of Manicaland and Mashaonaland, bordering Mozambique, while the main areas of production are Chipinge and Mutare.

Marshonalan Mashaonaland

Located in a series of mountains in northern Zimbabwe near the Mozambican border, Mashonaland has a cooler, wetter climate and higher rainfall than other parts of Africa, and has a lot of fog and dew because of its proximity to the Indian Ocean.

Qipingjia Chipinge

As an important birthplace of civilization in southern Africa, as early as the Middle Ages, the Shona established civilization here and created the large-scale ancient city of Great Zimbabwe Ruins in Zimbabwe. The name of Zimbabwe comes from the site of Greater Zimbabwe, where the unearthed Zimbabwe bird (Zimbabwe Bird) is also one of the symbols of the country.

50 kilometers east from the ancient city, it produces the highest quality coffee beans in Zimbabwe and the Chipinga region with the highest output in the country. This eastern highland, made up of the Chimanimani and Nyanga mountains near the Mozambican border, has good soil conditions, high posters, perennial precipitation and all the conditions needed to grow high-quality coffee.

Treatment method

Water washing is the main method of coffee treatment in Zimbabwe.

Selecting → to remove pulp → fermenting → washing → drying → shelling

First, add a lot of water to the coffee cherry, rinse away the immature fruits and impurities floating on the surface, select beans, and then use a peeling machine to remove the peel and pulp. Then put it into the fermentation tank to ferment for 18 hours for 36 hours, make the fermentation bacteria dissolve the pectin on the surface of coffee cherries, wash it with clean water, dry it for 1-3 weeks, then dry it with a machine, and use a sheller to remove endocarp, peel, seed shell and silver film, which is quite cumbersome.

Variety

Katim (Catimor)

In 1959, the Portuguese hybridized Brazil Kaddura and Timo to produce Katim / Katimo with strong disease resistance.

High-quality Zimbabwean coffee clubs mark "AA" in their bags and some with the words "Code 53" in their bags. In the United States, Zimbabwean coffee is generally circulated under the trademark "Zimbabwe Code 053", with occasional trademarks such as "Zimbabwe Chipinga", "Zimbabwe Rhodesia" and "Zimbabwe La Ruz".