Sigri Plantation Washed A

Coffee was first planted at Sigri Plantation in the 1950s by the famous crocodile hunter, Tom Cole. It is one of 6 coffee estates in PNG’s Western Highlands & Jiwaka Province owned and managed by WR Carpenter Estates. Carpenter Estates is focused on cultivating high-quality coffees that they export to buyers across the world from Belgium to Australia to the United States. 

Sigri and Carpenter’s other estates cultivate Arabica varieties, especially Typica and Typica hybrids from the well-known Jamaican Blue Mountain rootstock that was cultivated on Blue Mountain Estate in the 1930s. Blue Mountain rootstock has become synonymous with high-quality Arabica coffee production in both the Eastern & Western Highlands. 

Cherry is selectively handpicked and delivered to WR Carpenter’s wet mill, which the company believes is PNG’s biggest wet processing facility. At the wet mill, cherry is sorted and fully ripe cherry is pulped on a water-saving Pinhalense pulper, which is outfitted with a density sorter that removes any lights that passed visual inspection. These lights and any other cherry that were removed during visual ripeness selection are pulped and processed separately on a separate line specifically for these qualities.  

Once pulped, coffee is moved to tiled vats, fermented and then washed in clean water from the Waghi River. The Pinhalense pulper reduces water usage by as much as 50%.  

Wet parchment is sundried for 10 to 14 days.

Jiwaka Province was previously considered part of the Western Highlands Province. Jiwaka was separated into its own province in 2012. Much of Jiwaka is located on the fertile land of Waghi Valley. The Waghi River runs across the valley and offers many benefits to the Jiwaka people, who live on the land. The land’s volcanic soil is nutrient-rich and very fertile and many of the Jiwaka people farm tea and coffee as cash crops.