Ngozi

NGOZI
Ngozi sits in northern Burundi, near the Rwandan border, since 2025 part of the new Butanyerera province. Together with neighbouring Kayanza, it is the heart of the country’s coffee production, and Ngozi alone has roughly a quarter of Burundi’s washing stations. There are no estates here. Smallholders grow mostly Red Bourbon on hillside plots between about 1,700 and 1,900 metres and deliver their cherry to the nearest washing station. With so many stations competing for the best harvests, quality is what sets a coffee apart. 

RED BOURBON
Nearly all of Burundi’s coffee is Bourbon or one of its descendants. The Great Lakes strain goes back to French Mission Bourbon, which missionaries brought to Tanzania from Réunion (then called Bourbon Island) at the end of the 19th century. When coffee spread through Burundi under Belgian rule, Bourbon became the main tree planted, and it has stayed that way. Over the decades, farmers kept their own local selections such as Jackson and Mibirizi, which usually go to market simply as “Bourbon.” Red Bourbon is grown at altitude on small hillside plots and picked ripe by hand. That’s the source of the sweetness, clean citrus and tea-like character Burundi is known for, and you can taste it in the espresso.