Long Miles Kenya Project

"In partnership with Haron Wachira from Akili Holdings Ltd., we have refurbished Thunguri Coffee Factory in Kirinyaga County, Mount Kenya (just east of Nyeri County). In the past, the coffee factory existed to serve the Wachira family and a few of their neighbors who grow coffee in the region. While the Akili Group is not solely focused on coffee, we share the same vision of working with small-scale farmers to improve their coffee production, access to markets, and the price paid for the coffee they produce. Long Miles Kenya will be a long-term partnership with the Wachira family, and the communities of coffee growers in the Mount Kenya region. We will work directly with coffee farmers in the region, building long-term relationships with these communities. As we listen to and learn from the coffee farming communities and coffee factories in the area, we will begin to craft and implement a strategic production plan based off of close to a decade’s worth of experience in Burundi. Coffee farmers will be offered training in better agricultural practices to encourage future generations of sustainably grown Kenyan coffee. Back at the coffee factory, we will focus on implementing quality control protocols built specifically for Kenya, guaranteeing you exciting and well thought out micro-lots (mostly of the SL-28 variety). You will be able to build long-term relationships with coffee farmers in the region, purchasing consistently high-quality coffees and recognizable micro-lots directly from Long Miles instead of through the country’s traditional central auction system. It might sound crazy, but we believe the deeper our collective investment into a community goes, the better the coffee tastes. We’ve also been thinking about the possibility of starting a Long Miles Coffee Farm in Western Kenya for a while. After looking for over a year, we’ve found a piece of land at 2200 masl, close to the edges of a national forest park in Western Kenya. It’s here that we’ll soon be planting our first SL-28 coffee trees, pursuing regenerative farming practices. We’ll continue the works of our reforestation project, Trees For Kibira, in this region, planting out green belts of trees, and encouraging the practice of shade-grown coffee."