Okay, so it wasn’t frosty, but the nights were a little chilly, I swear. I am uploading some not-so-recent travelogues to the the world wide interweb, and realized this trip to Western Ethiopia from January 2011 had some amusing images. I have made quite a few trips out there since but this was the first time I landed in the farther reaches of Illubabor, as well as covering Jimma pretty well. There is a lot of promise for wet-processed coffee in the West, which was traditionally sold as low grade, undifferentiated dry-process coffee. With the new work we are doing there, farmers are receiving premiums far beyond what they ever could get for natural coffees of a commercial level, and much of this is based on the fantastic work of Technoserve to provide business advice, agricultural assistance, and market support to these cooperatives. -Tom

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