Horsham coffee brand is planting a tree in Rwanda for every bag of beans sold

Horsham Coffee Roaster is working with OneTreePlanted, promising that for every 1kg of their Rwandan coffee roasted and sold, they will donate $1 directly to the Gishwati-Mukura forest replanting project.

Since the initiative started in May 2019, Horsham Coffee Roaster has donated enough to plant 5,651 trees.

A spokesman for the brand said: “We’ve worked very hard over the last few years to reduce our CO2 impact.

“Some of our recent efforts including the purchase of a Loring S35 low emissions roaster, LED lighting in our roastery, an electric Nissan Leaf zero emissions business car, reusing packaging when we can and several other efforts to reduce the negative impact on the planet.

“For this approach, the reduction wasn’t enough, and we wanted to find a way to offset our CO2 emissions and to make a positive contribution to the planet. While trying to find the best way to do this we came across OneTreePlanted.

“We noticed that they work with a women’s co-operative in Rwanda located about one hours’ drive north of Bwishaza co-operative. The logical step for us was to come up with a way that we could contribute via the sale of our Rwandan relationship coffee.”

The Gishwati-Mukura forests of Rwanda once spanned 253,000 hectares, covering the land with over 60 species of trees.

Due to illegal mining and the resettlement of households after the genocide in 1994, overgrazing and tree cutting reduced the forests to a mere 3,558 hectares.

Horsham Coffee Roaster’s Rwandan blend comes after they first visited Rwanda in 2014, since developing some very close relationships within the coffee community there in Bwishaza.

The washing station there is co-operative owned and works with around 500 small-hold farmers. This naturally processed coffee is the best Rwanda has to offer.

For more about Horsham Coffee Roaster, visit www.horshamcoffeeroaster.co.uk