Oromia Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union: Afta Wanja and Babu Cooperatives

Oromia Coffee Farmers’ Cooperative Union (OCFCU) is a smallholder coffee grower-owned and operated cooperative union established in 1999. They focus on improving farmers’ income, quality services for member farmers and clients, and improving the social condition of farmers and the quality and productivity of Ethiopian coffee. Located in the Oromia Regional State, this region is known as a center of Ethiopian biodiversity and accounts for 65% of Ethiopia’s total coffee growing land.

When asked why the Bird Friendly certification is important and how they feel when they see birds and other wildlife on their farm, Tekle Tadese of OCFCU said, “The importance of having the Bird Friendly certification is to sell our product and to promote our farmers and farm worldwide. When we see different types of birds in our farm, we are very happy to have indigenous tree species that have different height and canopy. We measure ourselves by how we care for wildlife or biodiversity in general.”

Featured bird: Banded Barbet

Feathered fact: Endemic to Ethiopia and part of Eritrea. The numbers and abundance of this species have not yet been determined.