Collection: Muyinga Cooperative | Burundi

Ntwari carries the name of the woman behind it. In Kirundi, ntwari means courage, and hers is earned. Several years after her husband passed, she stepped into a business still dominated by men and found her footing there. She learned specialty cultivation alongside other women farmers through Jeanine Niyonzima-Aroian and JNP Coffee, picking up everything from cherry selection to the exacting standards specialty coffee demands. Now she's moved past learning into leading, bringing young women into the trade the same way she was brought in, one lesson and one harvest at a time.

Her coffee grows in Muyinga, part of what is now Buhumuza Province, in Burundi's northern highlands at 1,683 meters. Burundi is still new to the specialty stage, but the shift is real. Cooperatives across Ngozi, Kayanza, and Muyinga have rebuilt their washing stations from the ground up, trading inconsistent processing for real quality control and transparency. The mill that processes Ntwari is women-owned and women-run, sorting each natural lot by hand through Burundi's March-to-July harvest. What comes out is a Bourbon coffee with the vibrant acidity and layered, fruit-forward sweetness the region is starting to get noticed for, built on a wet mill that proves exactly who did the work.