Melkalati is named after a name of a river that runs through the village of Tore Badiya in Abaya county, West Guji Zone. The company was officially established in 2018 and since then it has been operating in different coffee growing areas. So far the company has focus on Guji and Gedeo coffees.

The company supplies both washed and natural coffees. Their washed coffee lots are produced at their own coffee washing stations built in Tore Badiya, Worqa and Dari Kojuwa villages. The company produces two natural coffee lots. The natural coffee lot produced at Haniku village in Kochere Woreda is traded as Tore Badiya while the natural coffee lot produced in Dari Kojuwa village in Hambella county, West Guji zone is marketed under the name of the village.

Smallholder coffee farmers in the respective villages and the surroundings deliver hand-picked coffee cherries directly to the respective coffee processing facilities owned by Melkalti Trading PLC. Once the farmers deliver the coffees, further quality improvement practice is carried out through manual labour to sort out under ripe, overripe and insect/pest damaged cherries. For both processing types, only well-ripen red cherries remain for further processing activities.

Village: Haniku
Specific site: Chinchesi
County: Kochere
Zone: Gedeo
Region: Southern Nations Nationalities and Peoples Region
Variety: 74140, 744, 74158, Wolisho
Processing: Washed and dried on African beds
Crop Year: 2020/21
Grade: Processed and cleaned for export following Grade 1 coffee grading specifications
Established: 2018
Altitude: 1800 – 2100 MASL
Organisational type: Private coffee drying station

Hand-picked coffee cherries are taken directly from farm to coffee processing sites for sorting out under ripe, overripe and insect/pest damaged cherries. Only well ripen red cherries remain for pulping using a locally made washed coffee processing machine called Agard. Immediately after pulping, coffee is soaked under water for 48 hours to undergo wet fermentation. During this period, water is changed every 24 hours. This round of fermentation is completed after confirming that the mucilage is completely removed through washing the parchment coffee using clean water. Lastly, clean parchment coffee is transferred to a soaking tank and stays there under water briefly (2-4 hours). The coffee is then transferred to a skin drying stage where stirring the parchment coffee around is carried out by hand under shade. This process usually lasts from 2-4 hours in the morning. Skin drying is immediately followed by the final main drying stage. In this final phase, parchment coffee is transferred on to a raised drying bed where it stays for 10 days till the bean moisture level reaches 10.0-10.5%. In the meantime, to maintain uniform drying among beans, the parchment coffee is set under the sun for two hours in the morning between 8:00 and 10:00 AM. To prevent the coffee from the hottest hours of the day, the parchment coffee is covered with nylon mesh and plastic between 11:00AM and 3:00 PM. In the afternoon, the parchment coffee is uncovered for another two hours between 3:00 PM-5:00 PM. This is a routine practice carried out throughout the main parchment coffee drying period.