STORAGE AND MILLING
Storage
Our natural coffee is packed in 60kg bags in two layers; inner is food grade plastic and outer is Penang bag to protect from insects. All bags are tagged by name and date and stored in a cool and dry location.
We have a 12 x 18m warehouse with good ventilation to store our natural and green bean coffee ready for milling. All coffee bags are placed off the floor on the metal palette.
The moisture content (60–65%) and temperature (19–25°C) inside the warehouse is carefully controlled with a moisture meter for greater accuracy. Moisture levels are kept at 11-12% before being sent to the dry mill.
Milling
We outsource our hulling, green sorting and all export procedures to our group company, Mandalay Coffee Group (MCG) Co. Ltd. The dry mill is 32 km from our farm.
MCG is one of the largest coffee companies in Myanmar. It buys Arabica cherries from small farmers, produces specialty coffee and exports it to the world.
We also exported our specialty coffee through MCG. Their processing and milling follows the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) guideline for exporting with HACCP certificates.
Staff and Operations
There are 25 employees working at Shwe Yi Mon farm including 23 youth and 13 women. Most of our workers are from the hot, dry zone in central Myanmar where they can’t grow anything except in the rainy season. So, employment is unstable there.
Generally, we hire from outside our area. Local farmers have their own farms and can't hire, so we need to find people from around the region.
There are also five couples with children and old parents staying together. Employing couples means they can work together and save more income. They can also bring their children and old parents.
We provide necessary school fees for their children and take responsibility for medical notes for their health. They enjoy working in our farm as we let them use some vacant land to grow seasonal vegetables and crops for their family and raise chickens and pigs for extra income.
We provide housing, safe well water, free electricity and store and sell them bulk rice bags, so they have a secure food supply. Most have been working here for over 10 years. We also hire casual workers during peak harvesting season.
We employed a coffee specialist agronomist to train our workers in systematic ways of planting, seedling, harvesting, processing, and storing.