Ethiopia

The so-called wet process in Ethiopia is mainly used when treating harvested berries. This process is typically used in countries that produce Coffea arabica L. Species, seeing that it enhances the taste and aroma, also highlighting the characteristics of single-origin beans; therefore, this method is used for specialty coffees, producing the highest quality beans.

Even though the wet method stages and materials can vary from country to country, it generally consumes large amounts of water. It generates more waste than the natural (dry) method.

In this document, a case report from the visit to the Dale district is carried out, seeking not only to explain the Ethiopian wet method but also to highlight and identify elements that can be improved to make the process more efficient and less polluting, suggesting key points so the same by-products could be used as a source for energetic purposes.

Dale district is one of the 19 districts in the Sidama region and covers a total area of 30,212 ha, located about 320 km south of Addis Ababa along the main highway to Moyale and 40km from the region capital Hawassa. The district shares a border with the Wonsho district in the east, the Loka-Abaya district in the west, Aleta Wondo and Chuko districts in the south and the Shebedino district in the north. The district is subdivided into 34 Kebeles, and all those produce coffee (WoFED, 2013).

Dale woreda is one of the potentially coffee-producing woredas in Sidama regional state and has the potential to produce a huge amount of coffee processing wastes every year, but the utilization of these materials is poor and left to decompose or burned in open fields; some of them are dumped in the environment including water bodies.