We have worked closely with the Idido Cooperative and its more than 1,000 members since 2011. Whether it is the high elevation, microclimate, or the predominance of Kurume type coffee varieties, the communities around the Idido village have produced some of our most stunning offers. The Cooperative has members scattered throughout the communities of Wegida, Aricha, Direto, Ela Tenecha, Bowicha, Haro Badami, and Gerse.
Nearby Yirgacheffe is one of the most famous coffee towns in Ethiopia, if not the entire coffee-drinking world. When we first traveled to Yirgacheffe, it was hard to believe that a town so tiny—if you blink while driving through it you might miss it—could have such a reputation. The reputation, however, is there for a reason. Yirgacheffe revolutionized Ethiopian coffee decades ago by building a washing station to process coffee in the "washed" style that was popular in Latin America. Yirgacheffe quickly became famous for its sweetly complex, almost tea-like washed coffees, and the area around Yirgacheffe has become renowned to coffee buyers around the world, including Counter Culture. Staggering altitude, ideal climates, and unique coffee varieties make this a truly special coffee region.
Idido is composed of a little more than 1,000 members in total. The members of Idido have very small plots of land around their house. They average 1.5 hectares of land, diversely planted with lots of different plants and shade trees. About half of that 1.5 hectares cultivates coffee. The area is also extremely densely populated (second only to Addis Ababa), making the diversity of the ecosystem even more impressive. While forested land and tree diversity are issues in many parts of Ethiopia including the south, compared to other regions of the world with this size of population, the amount of shade canopy is impressive. While a large percentage of the population here grows coffee as a cash crop, people are largely subsistence farmers. Enset (false banana) is the main food crop followed by many types of fruits, vegetables, and beans.
