On the evening of 25 August 2026, President Yoweri Museveni hosted the American artiste and actor Tyrese Gibson at State House. Africa Coffee Park was in the room, and coffee was on the table: a full brew bar, green and roasted beans, and the range that leaves Ntungamo finished rather than raw.
The President set out what he described as Uganda’s four sectors of socio-economic transformation, including the role artistes play in the services sector, and the conversation turned to the creative arts, to tourism, and to the shared history and heritage of Africa and African Americans. He wished his guest a fruitful visit.
For us the significance was narrower and, we think, larger. Dr. Nelson Tugume, our founder, put it this way afterwards: he was grateful to the President for believing in coffee value addition, and more so for embracing the bigger idea behind it, coffee tourism. Coffee is not only a crop. It is the farmer, the soil, the factory, the cup, the culture and the destination. The argument we have been making from Rwashameire is that people should come to Uganda to drink it where it grows.
“We must add value to our products before exporting them.” That instruction from the President is the sentence our whole operation is built around, and hearing it repeated in that room, to that guest, is what made the evening worth recording.
The visit was the start of a journey through the country rather than a single meeting, and it was made possible by the Uganda Tourism Board, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, and Kampala Capital City Authority, working with Explore Uganda on coffee tourism. Our thanks to all of them, and to our guest.
