Mozambican Coastal Coffee

Biodiversity: The solution reintroduces a critically endangered, endemic plant as a commercial solution for marginalised communities. The plant also reduces the international reliance of coffee consumers on only two types of the plant. 

Sustainable development: The plant is extremely drought resistant, heat resistant, grows in marginal, acidic soil, resistant to all known coffee plagues and diseases and produces a sustainable income to a group of persons on a small piece of co-cropped land.

Coastal protection: Through the tending of a climate resistant, uniquely adapted, endemic plant, in at-risk coastal zones, these areas are 'greened' by the introduction of a plant which can actually survive there. The plants stabilize the soil, which can then be co-cropped with many other commercial plants, such as papaja, casava, moringa, tamarind, etc. The soil is protected from erosion as the extensive root system of the plant, protects the soil from water and wind erosion. The demonstration of the ability of communities to earn a sustainable income from the land also reduces the reliance by coastal communities on marine resources only.

What the size of the potential impact on coastal populations will be is impossible to calculate. Mozambique alone has a population of 33 million, of which more than 80% (25 million people) live on the coastal flatlands. MIYOSI introduced the project at war affected communities in Cabo Delgado, at migrant communities who came to the cities to 'find work' at Chiango, outside Maputo and a severely marginalised communities in Ressano Garcia, the 'criminal' border town between Mozambique and South Africa. It has a snowball effect which caused an demand for the solution that MIYOSI cannot cope with, considering its limited resources.

Coastal plant biodiversity has been declining for generations. Many endemic plants are also critically endangered due to habitat loss and unsustainable land utilization practices. Mozambican communities have been identified as of the most likely to suffer from the effects of Global Climate Change events and are also rated as being of the poorest peoples in the world.

Our solution was to find a specific critically endangered, endemic plant, which is not in production anywhere in the country, analize the commercial value of its production, test it for resilience against drought, heat, poor soil with high acidity, pests and known diseases and to then start propagating it, using technology developed over years, to commercial levels. Economically viable quantities of this extremely rare and highly priced plant, which produces true Mozambican coffee is then distributed to communities which ensures sustainable income on small parcels of land.

The coffee, Coffea racemosa, is internationally highly sought after, demands a specialist coffee premium price, has a unique taste profile and is a natural extremely low caffeine coffee (so low that some catagorize it as a natural decaf). 98% of the coffee production in the world is produced by only two types of coffee (arabica and robusta) and both are threatened by increasing temperatures and eratic rainfall. Racemosa production need to be massively increased as shortfalls of up to 75% are predicted.

All research and development costs have been carried by MIYOSI, the product is already established at 5 locations across Mozambique, passed all trails and tests successfully and will start producing the first beans late in 2024. Production facilities, both for the production of large quantities of seedlings as well as to depulp, dehusk, dry, roast and package the product is lacking. 

Coastal communities. 

In Mozambique, these communities are neatly 100% reliant upon marine resources. Very few plants have the capacity to bring economically substantive incomes and grow in loose sea sand. The coastline of Mozambique is seen as unproductive wasteland after most large scale coconut and cotton production failed. Limited cashew nut and casava production fail to sustain communities because of the low value of the unprocessed crop. The average estimated income per person in Mozambique is less than 1 US Dollar per day. If the average income of the employed, mostly city-based, portion of the population is deducted, it becomes abundantly clear that the rural, mostly coastal based population of Mozambique, are in dire straits. Being in dire straits is not unique, but being without any potential solution due to a complete lack of focussed attention, innovation and the application of technology, is particularly damning.

The Mozambican Government is still described as an "autoritarian regime" although some flawed democratic processes are followed. The regime's belief in the socialist vision of wide rows of combine harvesters rolling across an immense wheatfield is an absolute reality. In Mozambique, that ideal can never realize for coastal communities and Government controlled funds are therefore mostly spent in the interior where large scale legume and maize prodution fits the image.

Me and my team live in Mozambique and are in daily contact with affected communities, irrespective if they are affected by marginalization, war, economic exclusion or other causes.

We all have extensive experience of Mozambique as illustrated below:

Flossina Duarte: CEO: Mozambican woman. Licenciate degree in Human Resources and HR Management.

Prof. Dr. Carlos Balate: Mozambican man: Dean of Academics - Institure Superior e Politechnic de Gaza (ISPG) - PhD Queensland, Australia

Johan Swart: South African man (due for Mozambican citizenship in 2025): MBA - University of Newport, USA

We are all schooled in different disciplines and have extensive experience of:

* Community development

* Academic research and reporting requirements

* Plant identification and propagation

* Economic modelling

* Project management

* Financial management and project reporting

The existence of the specific plant inside Mozambique was not proven. I found and tested numerous plant, which the population thought were racemosa, only to, through taste and flavour analysis, find out that it is the non-viable Coffea zanguebariae.

After finding a proven plant, we waited for it to make seed. The first year, we were notified late of the seeding and the seeds were no longer viable. Production: 0 seedlings. In the second year we produced 1400 seedlings and established:

* DNA and seed bank: 650 plants planted. 100% survival rate.

* Olumbe plantation: This is the town in Cabo Delgado province, Mozambique where the leader of the ISIS supported terrorist organisation was born. We convinced the community to allow us to try the plant and established 100 plants in white sea sand, 200 meters from the sea.

* Mute plantation: This community is close to Mocimba do Praia, the town were most people were killed in the terrorism attacks. We also planted 100 plants and the community now requested an expansion to at least 1000 plants.

* Senga plantation: Also in Cabo Delgado, Northern Mozambique, on the border with Tanzania. Planted 100 plants with 100% surviving after a year and a request to increase to 1500 plants.

Chiango Project: This children's environmental education centre is just outside Maputo and is sponsored by a large corporate. Plantation of 300 plants established with 700 plants on back order.

Hidden Valley project: 100 plants in a deep river valley where temperatures and humidity is extremely high. Trail duration: 3 months of which 2 are already past.

The success of the plant is incredible. In the seed and DNA bank, the plants grew, from seed, in excess of 1 meter in the first year. The first harvest is expected late in 2024. 

This project is proven in many different locations, under the harshest conditions possible and we now have proof that:

* The plant can withstand temperatures in excess of 45 degrees Celcius for extended periods of time

* The plant can survive periods of drought of up to 9 months of the year.

* The plant produces seed, 2 years after planting, where 'normal' coffee takes an average of 5 years.

* The plant can survive poor treatment as the survival rate of our plantations in poor, rural villages, proved.

In all instances the communities requested additional plants to increase their plantations as they are first hand witnesses of the durability of the plant under extremely poor conditions.

I was the Head of research at South Africa's Science and Technology Park, The Innovation Hub. I know the work and standard of MIT. If I could wish for an implementation partner, it would be MIT......

The range of interventions we need to make this a technological success are diverse and I know of very few institutions which, in collaboration with their partners, can pull this off.

Growing coffee at sea level is just not done in Africa. All coffee consumed in the world is currently produced at altitude. 

Finding, researching and propagating a plant which can do that is a disruptive innovation. 

The innovation lies in producing the world's second most consumed beverage (after water) in a totally different zone, without the requirements of altitude growing, high rainfall and  cool temperatures.

This innovative approach has the potential to become huge. 

The MIYOSI approach, to produce coffee through an outgrower model, such as followed in Kenya and Uganda, is also unique in Southern Africa.

The logical and accepted practice is to plant coffee high in the mountains where the rainfall is high and the temperature, cool. With global warming, the plantation owners are moving higher up the mountains to still get the same temperatures. This is the rainforest or permanent forest zone and it is removed to plant coffee. The EU came with a certification requirement for coffee to ensure that no forests are removed to plant the crop. As there is limited agricultural space at high altitude, the problem cannot be solved by using even more varieties of the two types of coffe which is currently used.

Only a totally different approach can solve the problem. MIYOSIs Coastal Coffee project does exactly that. It removed most of the obstacles to the production of a valuable crop through innovation.

The genetic diversity of coffee is getting narrower. The world has 124 known coffee types and 99% of the world's coffee production (3 billion cups per day) comes from 2 types of coffee. The support of MIT is required to physicall identify more coastal coffee types, technologically identify them (DNA), identify their attributes and potential benefits (Bio-molecular), create propagation methodologies (Bio-sciences) and identify target communities and the potential impact upon them (Social sciences and computer modelling)

The core technology is the knowledge on how to produce coffee using marginalized land, not commonly seen as suitable to produce such a valuable product. 

Coffee was produced in Mozambique before the civil war started in 1974. The population lost the know-how to produce coffee and the coffee type which has got a pleasant taste and is valuable, nearly became extinct.

Modern coffee production technology used in Brazil and Guatamala wont work next to the coastline in Mozambique. The traditional knowledge on how to actually produce the plant in commercial quantities, had to be re-developed by MIYOSI...... now the challenge to transfer the knowledge to an impoverished and war affected population, lies ahead. 

The technologies developed to process coffee will be valid to use for this coffee type but the size of the beans and the physical circumstances of South-Eastern Africa, will require an adjustment of existing technology to get an optimal result.

Full time staff: 4

Part time staff: 8

Contractors: 0

I first heard about Coffea racemosa 6 years ago. I started searching for it in 2018. I found many coffee plants in the forests across Mozambique, but DNA sampling showed that none of thos plants were Coffea racemosa. The plants all turned out to be Coffea zanguebariae, a plant with identical appearance but with a non-commercially viable taste.

I found the first racemosa plants in 2022, produced 0 seedlings in that year, 1400 seedlings in 2023 and 7000 seedlings in 2024.

Our team is small but consists of a mixed race African woman and Mozambican citizen (Sinna Duarte) as Chairperson / CEO, a black African man and Mozambican citizen (Prof. Dr. Carlos Balate) as technical advisor and community liaison person, a white African man, currently still a South African citizen but due for Mozambican citizenship in 2025 (Johan Swart) as business advisor and coffee expert.

Our workers are all Mozambican women and men. We employ men to prepare the plantations and women to tend the plants and to harvest.

The business ,model relies upon sales of seedlings to projects and then the later sales of 'green' coffee to roasters and distributors of coffee.

Racemosa coffee is of the rarest and most expensive coffee in the world and the demand for it is huge. All discussions with distributors and roasters have been incredibly successful and the demand would not be met even over the next 3 to 5 years of maximum production.

There is only one very small producer in South Africa and he does not want to sell plants to other producers. His complete crop is taken up by one buyer. Although the plant is endemic to Mozambique, there are NO producers of it in the country.

Internationally coffee production is in dire straits. The world relies on 2 types of coffee to deliver an estimated 3 billion cups of the beverage per day. The production of arabica and robusta beans have been severely affected by climatic events and the prediction is that the price of coffee with skyrocket simply because demand exceeds supply by far.

Community development projects in Mozambique, as one of the poorest countries in the world and also one of the most affected by climate events, is substantial. With the cooperation with MIT, many of these funding sources could be unlocked to ensure rapid growth and maximum impact.

The project is already financially sustainable as all development to date has been funded by the participants and through sales.

We have received no grants or funding and we stayed well clear of Governmental 'agricultural aid' packages offered in Mozambique.

The new technology required will however require expertise and funding that we do not have.