Founder and CEO Ete Coffee, Lichan Humtsoe, Paul and Suhad Dwaraka during the panel discussion at the Coffee Community meet-up at Kohima on December 28. (Morung Photo)
Morung Express News
Kohima | December 28
Coffee connoisseur has described the coffee produced in Nagaland as having the potential to be the best coffee in the world, and an expert today has urged coffee growers, roasters and brewers to “put Nagaland coffee first’ to make it popular globally and make it a unique product of the state.
Speaking at the 2nd edition of the Coffee Community meet-up 2019 this afternoon at Ete Coffee, Kohima, Suhas Dwarka, Authorised SCA Trainer (AST), Director, Benki Brewing Tools SCI Processing professional maintained that with the coffee industry going up globally, it is upon the people to take this in the right direction.
Appreciating the quality of coffee from the state, Dwarka urged the coffee community to educate the people on the multiple benefits of coffee business as it gives ample economic empowerment and employment opportunities to various sections of the people.
He also viewed that coffee roasters and brewers must work in close association with coffee growers for both quality and cost management, and also give them a fair price of the produce.
SCA Certified Barista, Brewer & Roaster Founder, Indian Coffee Culture, Paul observed that coffee culture has picked up in Nagaland in the last few years. Encouraging the growers, roasters and brewers to bring ‘Coffee culture’ in the state, he opined that they should meet more often and learn from each other in order to bring a strong foundation for the coffee industry to grow in the state.
Roasting coffee from a ‘kaddai’ to a professional roaster
Experimenting roasting coffee from a ‘kaddai’ (frying pan) just for the love of coffee few years ago, Lichan Humtsoe is the proud owner of Ete Coffee, Naga's own first coffee roasting company established in the year 2016. "Ete" in Lotha Naga word means "us" or "ours."
For the pure love of coffee, Humtsoe had moved out from his mainstream profession as a government employee, in pursuit of chasing his dreams to become self sufficient and reach out to as many as it can.
Subsequently, he launched the second Coffee Brewery in July 2019, free consultancy service in January 2019 and today his company launched the Coffee Education Programme (CEP) focusing on sensitization, identify, network and guidance and also the Coffee Lab Services (CLS).
Humtsoe informed that CLS comes under Ete Coffee School of Coffee Education and Center for Research & Innovations with the objectives for quality control facilities center at the earliest possible.
It also aim to equip coffee growers with high standard procedures, assessment and examination hub for plantation sites, raise a generation of competent coffee practitioners in order to take up future opportunity in the coffee industry and also enhance employability of youth through coffee industry by education with sound technical knowhow.
One of CLS objectives is to promote local enterprise through consultancy services, training programme, branding of local produce, create platform for advocacy, sensitisaton and safety net for growers, curators, traders and other coffee related issues and concerns and also give free access to lab services with nominal fees.
Why coffee community meet-up
The coffee community meet-up was organised to establish sustainable and symbiotic coffee ecosystem beneficial to all stakeholder; earth, people and coffee.
The meet-up strives to build coffee community through seminars, workshops and training to create more access points for knowledge sharing, establish support system by means of building facilities, portals etc.
Target groups include growers, processors, stockiest, exporters, roaster, coffee shop owners, researchers, leaders/influencers, institutions and policy makers with eyes on sustainability; establish quality control standards in all process chain from farm to cup.
The community also endeavors to explore the prospects of coffee industries together, promote specialty coffee, connect knowledge repositories and consortiums of coffee experts to enhance learning and growth and also encourage research and development.
