Growing coffee bushes in Jizan, Saudi Arabia’s southwestern area, is more than a job for Farah al-Malki. It’s a family custom that’s been passed down through the generations.
Coffee, which moved from Ethiopia to Yemen and then to the rest of the Middle East around the 15th century, has a lengthy relationship with the 90-year-old patriarch.
“I took over and passed it down to my sons and then to my grandchildren,” Malki told AFP as he watched his male relatives prune trees.
Jizan is known for its red Khawlani coffee beans, often blended with cardamom and saffron to give a yellowish hue of coffee locally known as ghawa and a taste markedly different from the bitter black liquid drunk elsewhere in the Middle East and in the West.
It remains an integral part of Saudi culture, so much so that the government has designated 2022 as “The Year of Saudi Coffee”.
Ghawa is a symbol of hospitality and charity that is served with dates in homes and royal palaces across the kingdom, breaking down societal barriers.
Malki, despite his advanced age, is still tending to the fields, dressed in a dark “chemise” shirt and ankle-length skirt known as a “wizrah,” as well as a belt with a dagger.
“The biggest issues we used to have were the lack of water and support,” said Malki.
However, in order to diversify the kingdom’s economy away from oil, and as part of a societal shift to change the country’s ultra-conservative image and open up to visitors and investors, the government launched a coffee promotion campaign last month.
It urged all restaurants and cafes to refer to Arabic coffee as “Saudi coffee.”
Saudi Aramco, the largely state-owned oil firm, has announced plans to open a coffee center in Jizan that will employ “modern irrigation techniques to boost agricultural capacity.”
