Eti Sumiati founded the Kelompok Tani Wanoja in the Kamojang highlands of West Java, creating a dedicated space where arabica coffee thrives at over 1,500 masl. Under her leadership, what started as a...
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Eti Sumiati founded the Kelompok Tani Wanoja in the Kamojang highlands of West Java, creating a dedicated space where arabica coffee thrives at over 1,500 masl. Under her leadership, what started as a small circle of six women has grown into a group of around 55 members, both women and men, farming the slopes of Mount Kamojang. She started Wanoja in June 2012, after retiring from the civil service, and gave it a name that says exactly what it was at the beginning. Wanoja means "woman" in Sundanese, because the group was first made up only of female coffee farmers.
The land helps. The farms sit on an old volcanic area between 1,500 and 1,700 metres, where the average temperature stays around 18°C and the coffee grows in the shade of pine trees. The soil is rich, the climate is cool and steady, and the cherries ripen slowly. That slow ripening is part of why the cup turns out as sweet and clean as it does.
Eti's idea was simple. Give women a real stake in coffee, pay fairly for quality, and let the work lift the whole village. It grew from there. The group built up its production season after season, and the mill is now run by her son, Satrea, keeping the operation in the family while Eti's original vision stays at the centre of it.
The quality has been recognised at the highest level. Wanoja placed both 2nd and 5th at the 2021 Indonesia Cup of Excellence, a rare result for a single group and a strong signal of how far the coffee has come. For Eti, the point was never only the scores. It was proving that a group of women farmers from Kamojang could grow coffee good enough for the world to notice.