• Burmese
Friday, June 13, 2025
No Result
View All Result
NEWSLETTER
The Irrawaddy
27 °c
Yangon
  • Home
  • News
    • Burma
    • Politics
    • World
    • Asia
    • Myanmar’s Crisis & the World
    • Ethnic Issues
    • War Against the Junta
    • Junta Cronies
    • Conflicts In Numbers
    • Junta Watch
    • Fact Check
    • Investigation
    • Myanmar-China Watch
    • Obituaries
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Opinion
    • Commentary
    • Guest Column
    • Analysis
    • Editorial
    • Stories That Shaped Us
    • Letters
  • Junta Watch
  • Ethnic Issues
  • War Against the Junta
  • In Person
    • Interview
    • Profile
  • Books
  • Donation
  • Home
  • News
    • Burma
    • Politics
    • World
    • Asia
    • Myanmar’s Crisis & the World
    • Ethnic Issues
    • War Against the Junta
    • Junta Cronies
    • Conflicts In Numbers
    • Junta Watch
    • Fact Check
    • Investigation
    • Myanmar-China Watch
    • Obituaries
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Opinion
    • Commentary
    • Guest Column
    • Analysis
    • Editorial
    • Stories That Shaped Us
    • Letters
  • Junta Watch
  • Ethnic Issues
  • War Against the Junta
  • In Person
    • Interview
    • Profile
  • Books
  • Donation
No Result
View All Result
The Irrawaddy
No Result
View All Result
Home News Burma

Shan State’s ‘Coffee Lady’ Moves up the Value Chain

Nyein Nyein by Nyein Nyein
January 17, 2019
in Burma
Reading Time: 3 mins read
0 0
A A
A coffee processor tests beans with a moisture meter at the Amara Coffee Processing Factory compound. / Amara Coffee / Facebook

A coffee processor tests beans with a moisture meter at the Amara Coffee Processing Factory compound. / Amara Coffee / Facebook

8.5k
VIEWS
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

As a young girl, Daw Su Su Aung picked and collected coffee beans to help her mother and grandmother, who were coffee growers and traders in Ywangan Township, southern Shan State.

As an adult, she continues the family business, both growing coffee and buying beans from local farmers and selling them to markets outside of town.

Now in her mid-40s, she has started to produce her own brand of coffee powder, Amara Arabica, which is made without the use of chemicals at any stage of production.

RelatedPosts

Chameleon Crony: How Myanmar’s ‘Baby’ Tycoon Thrived Across Four Eras

Chameleon Crony: How Myanmar’s ‘Baby’ Tycoon Thrived Across Four Eras

June 10, 2025
3.6k
Trump-Musk Alliance Melts Down in Blazing Public Row

Trump-Musk Alliance Melts Down in Blazing Public Row

June 6, 2025
475
ASEAN Corporate Giants Fueling Myanmar Junta’s War Crimes: JFM

ASEAN Corporate Giants Fueling Myanmar Junta’s War Crimes: JFM

May 26, 2025
2.3k

Both Amara coffee beans and powder yield a strongly aromatic coffee, and the brand has become well known locally since its launch in 2017. The products are not yet widely available in shops throughout the country, however. As more orders are received, the family-run business has plans to expand.

Daw Su Su Aung, the producer of Arama Arabica Coffee from Ywangan. / Nyein Nyein / The Irrawaddy

Daw Su Su Aung recalled, “I first made the coffee powder for home use and to give to friends and relatives as gifts. My specialty beans are exported; I roasted these fine quality beans for grinding, as I wanted my friends and relatives to enjoy the taste.”

She has received positive feedback, encouraging her to produce more for Myanmar’s growing coffee-lovers’ market. “That’s how this family business started,” she told The Irrawaddy recently.

Amara Coffee products / Amara Coffee / Facebook

Until three years ago, the smallholder coffee farmers in Ywangan mostly sold their raw green coffee beans at local markets in Shan State’s Aungban Township, or in Mandalay, as they lacked any means of processing the beans into high-quality products.

This has changed in the past three years, thanks to the US-funded Value Chains for Rural Development project, which focuses on the coffee industry and works closely with the Myanmar Coffee Association. The project provides training for coffee growers in the techniques used to produce high-quality beans.

Myanmar’s coffee industry has also developed thanks to the advocacy efforts of coffee lovers. The Ywangan Coffee Cluster is one of seven that comprise the Myanmar Coffee Association, and has more than 10,000 coffee growers producing high-grade Arabica beans.

Coffee farmers’ increased access to the processing know-how required to produce quality beans, and to coffee markets, has made it possible for them to export thousands of tons of coffee to Europe and the U.S., in addition to Asian markets including Japan, South Korea, Thailand and China. From fiscal 2015-16 to October 2018, total coffee exports, including border trade, amounted to more than 1,500 metric tons (MT) valued at over US$5.2 million, according to U Ye Myint, the chairman of the Myanmar Coffee Association. In fiscal 2017-18 alone, exports exceeded 477 MT.

Women select coffee beans at the Amara Coffee processing factory. / Amayar Coffee Women Producer Group / Facebook

At the end of 2015, Daw Su Su Aung started learning to produce high-quality beans through a U.S.-funded training program run by WinRock International, an INGO helping coffee growers and processors in Myanmar. Six months later, she brought together other coffee farmers, mostly women, from about five villages in her town, and applied for a USAID grant.

The value chain project helped her to start building the Amara Coffee Processing Factory. The facility processes the beans of every farmer in her network, and hosts training programs related to coffee “cupping” (the process of evaluating the aroma and taste of coffee) and quality control.

When this reporter met Ywangan’s “Coffee Lady” at the Amara Coffee processing facility in the township last year, she was attending a quality assessment training session hosted by her facility.

Coffee dries in the sun at the Amara Coffee processing factory compound. / Amayar Coffee Women Producer Group / Facebook

“We use the natural, or ‘dry’, system of processing as taught by WinRock, which produces better quality beans. In 2015-16, our specialty coffee developed a reputation in the area. We launched Ywangan Coffee as a specialty brand and it debuted in the U.S. market [in 2016],” Daw Su Su Aung said.

The Amara Coffee processing factory now benefits some 300 families in 20 villages in Ywangan, whose coffee beans are processed into quality products. The factory produced 20 tons of specialty coffee in 2017, double the amount produce a year earlier.

She also leads the Amayar Women’s Coffee Producer Group, which provides alternative employment opportunities to women in nearby villages by producing specialty coffee.

Now that growers have gained access to the new and more valuable international markets in the U.S., “Their incomes have increased too, because the price of raw beans has risen. Workers now earn at least 100,000 kyats per month,” she said.

However, as with other types of farming, coffee growing requires extra labor during the harvest season, despite the fact that many local coffee farmers in Ywangan work on their own plantations.

In December and January, when the coffee cherry beans are ready to be picked, finding enough workers can be tough, Daw Su Su Aung said.

Your Thoughts …
Tags: AgricultureBusinessCoffeeDevelopmentExportsvalue-added
Nyein Nyein

Nyein Nyein

The Irrawaddy

Similar Picks:

Post-Coup Myanmar is a Family Business: Min Aung Hlaing & Co
Burma

Post-Coup Myanmar is a Family Business: Min Aung Hlaing & Co

by David Aung
February 8, 2024
17.9k

Min Aung Hlaing is an opportunistic businessman in military uniform and his children are more mercenary than the offspring of...

Read moreDetails
KIA Seizes Myanmar Junta’s Last Remaining China Trade Route in Kachin State
War Against the Junta

KIA Seizes Myanmar Junta’s Last Remaining China Trade Route in Kachin State

by The Irrawaddy
June 14, 2024
17.1k

The military regime has also lost control of all border trade in neighboring northern Shan State.

Read moreDetails
Myanmar Junta Reportedly Set to Prosecute High-Profile Businessmen for Corruption
Junta Cronies

Myanmar Junta Reportedly Set to Prosecute High-Profile Businessmen for Corruption

by The Irrawaddy
October 18, 2023
15.9k

Regime cronies Thein Win Zaw and Mu Mu Shein are set to follow former lieutenant general Moe Myint Tun as...

Read moreDetails
Myanmar Junta’s ‘Brainless’ Response to Soaring Gold Prices Leaves Market in Disarray
Analysis

Myanmar Junta’s ‘Brainless’ Response to Soaring Gold Prices Leaves Market in Disarray

by Hein Htoo Zan
June 4, 2024
14.8k

Arrests, corruption, false receipts—the crisis in the gold and currency markets bears all the hallmarks of the junta’s inability to...

Read moreDetails
Myanmar’s Multibillion-Dollar Jade Trade ‘Crashing’ as China Clamps Down  
Business

Myanmar’s Multibillion-Dollar Jade Trade ‘Crashing’ as China Clamps Down  

by The Irrawaddy
June 5, 2024
14.3k

Crackdown on border scams and tax fraud is taking heavy toll on gems trade, say merchants.

Read moreDetails
Singapore and Indonesia in Spotlight Over Illegal Arms Exports to Myanmar
Guest Column

Singapore and Indonesia in Spotlight Over Illegal Arms Exports to Myanmar

by Bertil Lintner
October 3, 2023
11.7k

Two recent cases reveal how companies have evaded local and international rules to supply the junta with military hardware.

Read moreDetails
Load More
Next Post
A border guard police officer on duty in Maungdaw Township, Rakhine State. / Min Aung Khine / The Irrawaddy

Border Guard Police Wounded in Rakhine Rebel Ambush: Myanmar Army

AA leader Maj-Gen Tun Myat Naing (second right) attends an ethnic armed organizations peace conference in Kachin State in July 2016. / The Irrawaddy

Nationalists Subject Journalist to Devastating Legal Ordeal

No Result
View All Result

Recommended

The Hidden Fallout From China’s Cross-Border Crime Crackdown in Myanmar

The Hidden Fallout From China’s Cross-Border Crime Crackdown in Myanmar

4 days ago
1.4k
How the Myanmar Military’s Propaganda Efforts Have Evolved Over the Decades

How the Myanmar Military’s Propaganda Efforts Have Evolved Over the Decades

2 days ago
847

Most Read

  • Civilians in Need as Arakan Army Advances on Kyaukphyu

    Civilians in Need as Arakan Army Advances on Kyaukphyu

    shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Myanmar Junta Reinforces Kyaukphyu as AA Nears China-Backed SEZ Hub

    shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Myanmar Junta Advances into Karenni State

    shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Myanmar Jade Hub Burns as Junta Counteroffensive Penetrates Hpakant

    shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • China Defends Myanmar Junta on Human Rights at UN

    shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0

Newsletter

Get The Irrawaddy’s latest news, analyses and opinion pieces on Myanmar in your inbox.

Subscribe here for daily updates.

Contents

  • News
  • Politics
  • War Against the Junta
  • Myanmar’s Crisis & the World
  • Conflicts In Numbers
  • Junta Crony
  • Ethnic Issues
  • Asia
  • World
  • Business
  • Economy
  • Election 2020
  • Elections in History
  • Cartoons
  • Features
  • Opinion
  • Editorial
  • Commentary
  • Guest Column
  • Analysis
  • Letters
  • In Person
  • Interview
  • Profile
  • Dateline
  • Specials
  • Myanmar Diary
  • Women & Gender
  • Places in History
  • On This Day
  • From the Archive
  • Myanmar & COVID-19
  • Intelligence
  • Myanmar-China Watch
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Food
  • Fashion & Design
  • Videos
  • Photos
  • Photo Essay
  • Donation

About The Irrawaddy

Founded in 1993 by a group of Myanmar journalists living in exile in Thailand, The Irrawaddy is a leading source of reliable news, information, and analysis on Burma/Myanmar and the Southeast Asian region. From its inception, The Irrawaddy has been an independent news media group, unaffiliated with any political party, organization or government. We believe that media must be free and independent and we strive to preserve press freedom.

  • Copyright
  • Code of Ethics
  • Privacy Policy
  • Team
  • About Us
  • Careers
  • Contact
  • Burmese

© 2023 Irrawaddy Publishing Group. All Rights Reserved

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • News
    • Burma
    • Politics
    • World
    • Asia
    • Myanmar’s Crisis & the World
    • Ethnic Issues
    • War Against the Junta
    • Junta Cronies
    • Conflicts In Numbers
    • Junta Watch
    • Fact Check
    • Investigation
    • Myanmar-China Watch
    • Obituaries
  • Politics
  • Opinion
    • Commentary
    • Guest Column
    • Analysis
    • Editorial
    • Stories That Shaped Us
    • Letters
  • Ethnic Issues
  • War Against the Junta
  • In Person
    • Interview
    • Profile
  • Business
    • Economy
    • Business Roundup
  • Books
  • Donation

© 2023 Irrawaddy Publishing Group. All Rights Reserved

This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this website you are giving consent to cookies being used. Visit our Privacy and Cookie Policy.