When Tharcis (Tar-cease) Ntahonkuriye wandered into my makeshift studio space in the coffee hills, this 76 year old mostly toothless coffee farmer won me over instantly. It is a running family joke that my dad, whose name is Bruce Wayne, is THE real-true-one-and-only Batman. Seeing Tharcis in his Batman hat out in the rural African coffee hills made me smile. He lives near the Long Miles Coffee Project washing station, but during our first season he didn’t deliver his coffee cherries to us. He thinks he will next year now that he has seen that we pay on time, offer farmers extra premiums and benefits, and are concerned about the well being of his community. Tharcis has two daughters that have died and a son that he has lost touch with. He has been farming coffee since he was 20 years old, right thought the devastating Hutu/Tutsi war that shook the region. Tharcis has around 300 coffee trees, which last season earned him just 25,000 FBU… a little over $16.
He has been walking 3 or 4 kilometers (up to 2.5 miles) to deliver his cherries to the washing station each day. It is for elderly farmers like Tharcis that we want to purchase a fleet of bikes and set up coffee collection points around the region. Not only would Tharcis not have to walk as far, but his coffee cherries would also not have time to ferment in the hot sun. The bikes would provide jobs to people in the community as drivers and collection point managers. Fingers crossed that we can secure funding to get that up and running soon.
Tharcis also mentioned to me that beer and rice are his favorite foods now that he has no teeth. : )
Beautiful story, what an amazing man. Praying that you guys can get funding for the bikes to help more farmers like him!
Thanks, Emily!
THARCIS is a wonderful man love his hat and your heart to help him and others.
Batman
What hit me about this story: 300 trees equals ~ $16, i.e. the annual wage of a coffee farmer in Burundi. I wonder if coffee consumers would be willing to change their low-price coffee standards if they knew the realities of where the beverage comes from.
Beautiful photos, as well.
Have you tried crowd funding by now? I’d love to be able to donate money to be shared amongst the farmers to ease the hardship of their lives. GOFUNDME is a facebook crowdfunder, but there are many others; just google ‘crowd funding’.
Wow, what amazing stories you have from the array of farmers on your site. When I think of heroes, I think of people like these farmers who have the resilience and fortitude to get up everyday and keep going in these difficult conditions. Thanks for sharing their stories. :)