Page 22 - Fiji Traveller Issue 1

Changing lives one cup at a time

Bula Coffee

By Kite Pareti “Our coffee has changed lives in some of the most remote
Fijian communities,” Fryett says, giving the example of one
“Money is not the sole reason we exist. We exist to give people grower who has used the income she has earned to lift those
a hand up, to give people a better shot at life, to give people around her.
access to education, and to give them financial independence,” “She makes pillows and cushions and sells them for Fijian
says Luke Fryett of Bula Coffee. weddings or funerals, for engagements or birthday parties. She’s
Fryett launched Bula Coffee ten years ago. “We started off never had a sewing machine and has always wanted to be able
buying coffee off one family in a Fijian village, [and have] grown to afford one. With her coffee money, she bought her first two
over the last ten years to harvesting coffee from about 52 villages sewing machines,” says Fryett.
and [supporting] 5,000 people annually.” “I looked at her kind of strangely and said, 'Why have you
Now he has opened the doors to locals and tourists, who not bought two sewing machines?' She smiled at me and said, 'Now
only get the chance to taste Fiji’s wild harvested coffee, but also I can [help] everyone else in the village who doesn’t have one.'”
become part of the Bula Coffee journey. A few months later, the same woman had started her own

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