A Coffee Revolution In Yemen

Qima Coffee is improving lives by bringing top-quality techniques and new business practices to the war-torn Middle Eastern country

- Julian Loayza

In the early days of speciality coffee, one of its driving forces was the desire to do good. As well as being motivated by a love of coffee and a desire to increase quality, its exponents believed speciality coffee could outdo fairtrade in making a real difference at origin. But as the speciality scene has grown more businesslike, a certain cynicism has set in.

Qima Coffee, though, is making a difference. It originates in Yemen, a nation ravaged by a civil war that the UN calls the world’s worst man-made disaster. More than 20 million Yemenis are “food insecure”, while two million children are acutely malnourished. It’s against this background that Qima has set out its mission.

Yemen has a case for being the birthplace of coffee: the beans were first commercially planted, roasted and traded there. Dave Eggers’ 2018 book