Changing the Kenya Small Estate Sector

In specialty coffee, as we know, single-farm coffees often fetch higher prices. In recent years, opportunity for direct-trade, which favors single-producer coffees, has expanded significantly, giving small estate owners a chance at establishing long-term direct-trade relationships and building name recognition for their farms. Small estate farmers who focus on quality can fetch top prices and can receive an unparalleled return.  

It is surprising, then, that the small and medium estate sector in Kenya has, until now, been frequently overlooked. Especially when it comes to dry milling, small estate owners have found themselves unable to mill their parchment and maintain traceability, which lowers their overall returns and removes potential for name recognition and direct-trade relationships.  

Selling coffee under a single farm name can make a big difference. While cooperatives require fees for management and maintenance, the small estate farmer can hold onto 95% of the FOB price that they are free to invest in any way they see fit. Our sister company in Kenya, Sucafina in Kenya (Kenyacof), recognized this potential. When they opened operations, in 2014, small-to-medium estates were a top priority.   

Sucafina’s Presence  

The Kenyan specialty coffee industry has long been renowned for its quality. It is also an enormous entity that has been slow to change. Though the harvest coming from Kenya continues to be strong in quality, yields are declining annually, and we believe that Kenyan coffee could do with at least a measure of disruption.  

Sucafina began investing in the small and medium estate sector from the moment they opened operations in 2014. They didn’t own a dry mill, but they had a lot of expertise, so initially much of the outreach was in agricultural extension work. They began helping farmers not only to improve yields but also to engage farmers with Good Agricultural Practices that prioritize the health of the farm as a whole. They also focused on training in processing for quality, teaching farmers the best way to operate and maintain their pulpers, use grading channels effectively and methodologies for drying.   

Signs of Change 

Sucafina is involved in the many stages of the coffee supply chain that lead up to the final milling. In order to help increase quality on small estates, Sucafina offers a suite of services to farmers in the supply network to help them garner the best quality premium possible.   

One key project is teaching farmers cupping skills. Attaining cupping skills can be a great way for farmers to have a better sense of what their coffee is worth, understand the value of quality improvement and much more. “The cupping and all of that instilled a lot of confidence with me in what they’re doing there,” Danna Wasserman, Trader at Sucafina North America says, displaying the trust and admiration we have for our in-country partners at origin.  

To understand why Sucafina’s focus is transformative, a little background might help. 

Beginnings of the Current System  

During colonial rule, Kenyan nationals were only allowed to start planting coffee in the 1950s, and in the beginning, they were only allowed a maximum of 100 trees. If a farmer proved their proficiency in coffee farming, they may have been allowed to add more trees.   

The cooperative system formed as a natural response to small yields. The Kenya Planters Cooperative Union (KPCU) for many years was responsible for all dry milling and marketing of the crop. This system remained in place until fairly recently.  

Beneficiaries of the Current System  

The cooperative run ‘Factory Model’ (as washing stations are called in Kenya) is a key factor in enabling the country’s 700,000 smallholder coffee farmers to produce reliably high-quality coffees year after year. The system works incredibly well for farmers who may not benefit greatly from operating their own wet mills. According to the model, smallholder farmers deliver their cherry to a cooperative-owned washing station. Their cherry is combined with other members, and the factory then sorts, pulps, ferments, grades and dries their coffee.   

A good factory applies very strict controls to post-harvest activities, preserving cup quality at one of the most precarious junctions in a coffee bean’s life. Smallholder farmers, many of whom only have 250-500 trees, are saved time and labor and can entrust their cooperative to sell their coffee (combined with other members’) at a good price. The profits from the sale are then passed on to the farmer based on the volume each delivered during that season.  

This system, while not perfect, worked reasonably well for smallholders until the late 1980s and 1990s, when many began calling for alternative systems.    

Around this time, due to calls for change, farmers of a certain size (2,500 trees) were given the opportunity to obtain a pulping license to start their own mini factory (located on the farm) for the first time. The small estate sector was born. Eventually, private millers were allowed to operate, presenting additional opportunities for Cooperatives and Small Estates, alike. 

The Rise of the Small Estate  

Despite the changes to the system in the 90s, change was slow to take hold. Despite being a significant contributor to national coffee production, small coffee estates in Kenya continued to fall through the specialty coffee processing cracks.  

Despite the new regulations for pulping, many farmers who qualified for pulping licenses continued to deliver cherry to a centralized cooperative-owned factory, where their production was combined with that of others from their region. Some simply did not have the resources to purchase equipment, and in cases where they did, many did not have access to information on operating a small factory effectively. 

Even for farmers who may have had their own processing set up, the dry-milling set-up within the country did not well serve small-to-medium size farmers. Traditional dry mills in the country have lot minimums, which are usually about 50 bags of parchment per lot. As with the factory system, combining many farmers’ yields into a single lot serves a practical purpose for the dry mills.  However, these quantities are often unattainable for smaller farmers, necessitating that they merge their lots with others, losing traceability.  If a lot is smaller than the minimum, factories may be faced with extra fees or be unable to mill the parchment without first combining with other lots to meet the minimum.    

Due to these two factors, many farmers with landholdings between 5-50 acres continued to be underserved by a system geared to very small or quite large farmers.  

When Sucafina opened operations in 2014, they recognized that small factories already existed on many farms of 5-20 acres. While many of these farmers are very strong in their approach to farm management, they lacked experience with the processing side of the business. Lot separation and traceability were possible. The system just needed disrupting. 

_{*this article has been edited from it's original version on 08/04/2025}