"We buy coffee from Cameroon."

Translation: Nous achetons du café du Cameroun.

[Mokuji]

Why "du" before café?

[Sitesurf]

You should read the Tips and Notes from the online version if you can't access them on your platform.

"du" is required with the meaning of "an unknown amount of a mass thing".

"du" is a partitive article used before masculine uncountable nouns starting with a consonant.

Whenever you can add "some" before a mass noun without changing the meaning, you can be sure the French will require a partitive article.

The feminine singular partitive article is "de la".

When the mass noun starts with a vowel sound (vowel or mute H), you will use "de l'"

• nous achetons du café, du vin = we buy (some) coffee, (some) wine.
• nous achetons de la viande, de la bière = we buy (some) meat, (some) beer
• nous achetons de l'alcool (masc.),de l'eau" (fem.) = we buy (some) alcohol, (some) water

[Miko683584]

Can you explain why it is "du" Cameroun and not "de"? Thanks!

[Sitesurf]

Countries use articles: "le Cameroun". And as usual "de+le" has to contract to "du".

[MertMort]

Thanks Sitesurf. Can you explain why there is no article in "Ce tapis peut venir d'Egypte?"

[Sitesurf]

Feminine countries behave differently (please, don't ask me why).

Je viens de France (f.), d'Egypte (f.)
Je viens du Cameroun (m.), des Pays-Bas (m. pl.)

[MertMort]

Ah, thanks! If I can remember en/au then I should be able to remember this rule too.