Shakisso Farm is located in the Guji zone in the southern Oromia Region. Haile Gebre and his wife Dimbelal Endale started this organic farm in 2001. Haile and his wife own two farms and a washing station under the Mordecofe (Mora Mora River Valley Development Organic Coffee) umbrella. In addition, Haile and his wife also work with 300 small-holder farmers (or ‘out-growers’ as they are called in Ethiopia) surrounding Mordecofe. The farm is spread out over 640 hectares with about 420 hectares planted with semi-forest coffee. It has its own nursery sites to grow seedlings to which the out-growers can access free of charge.
Haile is also passionate about organic farming and believes that this is the only truly sustainable way to produce coffee. He has a program to compost organic material, including the pulp from coffee cherries, and encourages his out-grower partners to follow this program as well. Haile cares deeply about the environment. To this end has set aside 70 hectares to keep as a natural forest preserve and takes a very careful and considered approach to farming coffee sustainably.
In addition, Haile works closely with the 300 out-growers to face the challenges of their delicate ecosystem, poor farming education, and limited access to quality and sustainability programs. Haile believes enthusiastically that Mordecofe’s success is reliant on the success of the local community in Shakisso. They have many social programs in place to help develop the local community. They have also helped build a primary school for the local community to provide care and education to the children of Mordecofe’s out-grower partners.
