Create increased brand awareness allowing us to scale up production, support and train more women, give them access to additional tiered roles in our value chain and ensure that their children go to school Cultivate further innovation and positive social and environmental impact by expanding the market for our coffee ground briquettes and also fund the research and development of future coffee-based products Foster business relationships with the tourist industry to expand our Kyaffe Farmers Coffee Tours leading to empowering roles for the female farmers we work with where they can share their expertise of coffee and Uganda Ultimately, purchasing land and creating a women’s development center which will not only serve as a safe space for women to congregate but also be an entrepreneurial hub for them to explore their own enterprising ambitions, receive mentorship, grow their own coffee plantation, operate a cafe and restaurant and a gift shop to sell their handicrafts.

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My name is Elizabeth Nalugemwa and I am the Founder & Director of Kyaffe Farmers Coffee. I am also a member of the 2018 Inaugural Class of Leaders: Africa selected by the Obama Foundation. I grew up on a coffee plantation in central Uganda in a place called Masaka. My mother was a smallholder coffee farmer. Her efforts to generate an income for our family were deemed a threat by my father and that led to domestic violence and their eventual separation. I witnessed my mother, at the age of 35, ultimately end up losing all she had worked for and having to start completely over by working other people's land for pay. As a result of her struggles, it was instilled in me from a young age a passion and determination to someday work to alleviate the struggles of female coffee farmers in my country. This is my vision to change the community I live in.Here in Uganda, as in many parts of of the world, my mother's experience is far from unique. While women smallholder farmers play a crucial role in growing and preparing ingredients for many global products, their contribution is often unrecognized, unpaid and invisible. In many cases, women provide the majority of agricultural labor, yet transporting crops to market and sales are largely done by men. This creates barriers for women in terms of both income and leadership and I am committed to changing that.In the communities where Kyaffe Farmers Coffee operates, women and children lack vital educational, economical and health-related support services that often lead them into risky situations for survival such as early marriage, pregnancy and sex work. The consequences of such actions include gender-based violence, dropping out of school, drug abuse, sexually-transmitted infections/HIV and a perpetuated cycle of poverty and oppression.In response to these issues, we have developed our programs with the overall aim to tackle pervasive gender inequality and to see societal transformation by creating sustainable livelihoods for these women. And with the growth of our social business, we will be in a much stronger position to do that. Coffee is one of the world’s most traded commodities with Uganda being a top producer. We purchase our coffee at fair trade prices from 50 cooperatives consisting of 1500 farmers in the two growing regions in our country. We aim to ultimately source beans from 5000 coffee growers. We have also worked with those farmers to process an alternative to charcoal, a briquette made from waste coffee grounds that they themselves can make and sell and use in their own homes instead of contributing to deforestation.With your support, I envisage some key goals -Other Awards/Recognition1. Winner for Best New Coffee Product - 2018 National Innovation Challenge2. Winner - Hidden Talent Awards from StartHub Africa3. Winner - Open Innovation Awards from Agrifood, Italy4. Finalist - Women in Africa 20185. Finalist - Ye Global Awards 20186. Finalist - Thought For Food 2018, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil