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Ethiopia aspires to boost coffee
production
BY TEWODROS KASSA
According to the information
found from the Ethiopian Coffee
and Tea Development and Marketing
Authority the country has produced
a total of 449,000 tons of coffee in
the last nine months. Out of this total
production, the country has exported
159,652 tons of coffee and generated
560 million USD.
Though the country has huge
potential of growing flavorsome
coffee, it has not benefited more
from the sector. And the country is
undertaking massive coffee
production and productivity
improvement efforts throughout the
whole coffee growing destinations.
As it has potential for coffee
production with 6.19 quintals per
hectare productivity, the nation has
set a goal of increasing coffee export
to support its economic development.
In an exclusive interview with
The Ethiopian Herald, Authority
Director General Sani Redi said that
the country is aspiring to become
the world’s second coffee exporting
nation next to Brazil in the near
future. Modernizing coffee value
chain, employing IT assisted export
control system and improving
Ethiopian Commodity Exchange
(ECX) capacity and encouraging
farmers who are producing coffee
to utilize modern technologies are
fundamental tasks being carried out
to realize the target, according to
him.
“Having 5.47 million hectare of
land favorable for coffee plantation,
Ethiopia has coffee plantation
cultivated only on one million
Nation's effort towards greenery program
T
BY YOHANES JEMANEH
he fact that biology tells
us is life is the result of mutual
existence. Nothing is capable to stand
alone. Even human being that has the
ultimate power to control the nature
cannot live without the existence of
plants and animals for life is the result
of interdependence. Cognizant of this,
Ethiopia has been implementing
various greenery programs that would
encourage local and global effort
towards conserving environment.
Accordingly, the country is striving
to increase the gain from forestry from
the current four to eight percent of the
national GDP by 2020. Similarly, it
is also working to upgrade forest
coverage from 15.5 to 20 percent
within similar period. Therefore,
greenery programs are designed and
under implementation in the Growth
and Transformation Plan (GTP), REDD
plus and the Provision ofAdequate
Tree Seed Portfolios (PATSPO)
projects.
According to Kebede Yimam, State
Minister of the Ministry of
Environment, Forest and Climate
Change (MEFCC), the greenry
programs are bearing fruits as the
country's forest coverage increased
from three to 15 percent over the past
two decades. Currently, the ministry
is exerting efforts to implement
PATSPO project to enhance forest
landscape restoration and to realize
Over 5.3 million Ethiopian farmers cultivate coffee.
hectare of land; this retards the
country from benefiting more from
the sector due to various bottlenecks.
The authority is expecting over
700,000 tons of coffee production
this year. Increased attention has
been given to the promotion
of separate brands of Ethiopian
coffee,” he noted.
Accordingly, the volume of
export planned for the year would
make the country the second largest
coffee exporting country through
green economy, he added. The project
will stay for four years and lead by
the ministry in collaboration with
Centre for Research in Agro Forestry
(CRAF).
Recently a workshop was
organized by the ministry in
collaboration with CRAF to discuss
on the objectives and current status
of the project. On the occasion, State
Minister Kebede said that the project
would help the country to realize
greenery through providing quality
tree seed, knowledge and capacity
building support. It would help to
improve the traditional tree seed
collection, storage and distribution
mechanism. ICRAF Country
Representative and PATSPO’s Project
Country Director Dr. Kiros Meles
believed that the commencement of
the project is critical to advance
country's forestry in quality tree seed
collection and seed management
system that is believed to enable
Ethiopia to achieve its plan of
restoring 22 million hectare land forest
by 2030.
The four-year long project program
mainly intended for reducing land
degradation, climate change and
agricultural land expansion impacts
that happen due to the increasing
number of population has been
considered to play significant roles.
The project implementers and various
stakeholders have reached common
understanding to utilize the
international forestation experience
in line with nation’s indigenous
acquiring more income. According
to the Central Statistical Authority,
over 5.3 million Ethiopian farmers
cultivate coffee, tea and spices
throughout the country. In order to
generate more from the sector various
measures are being undertaken to
boost coffee production in the
country. Among these, working
closely with pertinent stakeholders
and coffee growing farmers to meet
the country’s goals in the sector
through improved technologies of
knowledge.
The project would help the country
to develop the capacity of seed
providing institutions through
upgrading the system and
communication among stakeholders,
believed Dr. Abayneh Derero,
Forestry Expert at MEFCC. As to
him, the establishment of the project
would help to modernize the country’s
informal tree seed providing system
which lacks scientific process to
formal level by resolving financial
and knowledge constraints. It is also
significant to achieve the national
greenery program through providing
quality tree seed in line with
prioritization system which includes
the climate, soil and seed type and
other factors that are critical scientific
measurements for healthy growth of
a plant, he said.
The project which has been
implemented by the financial support
from Norwegian Government and
lead by the ICRAF in collaboration
with the MEFCC was started in 2017
and it will stay until 2020. The
concrete outputs that are expected
when the project is phase out are
efficient delivery system, modernized
tree seed and seedling knowledge
and information system, conservation
and breeding and capacity building
to the national tree seed development.
The right tree to the right place is the
heart of the plan for proper cultivation
system. This is significant to the
forestation activity of the country.
For nations like Ethiopia where
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD TUESDAY 12 JUNE 2018
coffee seedlings are the core
activities. In addition to these, with
a view to implementing coffee
seedlings improvement, the authority
has been working on supplying the
required inputs and carrying out wide
public mobilization and awareness
creation training.
“Coffee circumcision, latest coffee
plantation mechanisms and proper
fertilizer utilizations are essential
activities to regenerate the country’s
capacity of coffee production,” he
millions are usually suffering from
drought caused by poor environment
conservation, exerting huge effort to
increase forest coverage is a must to
alleviate the problem. Therefore,
implementing all programs through
coordinated participation of
stakeholders is expected from the
ministry. Increasing the public
awareness on collecting seed and
cultivating plants is critical to this
end. It is also significant to implement
the state-of-the-art technologies for
emphasized.
This year over one million coffee
seedlings have been prepared to be
planted in the coming rainy season.
In addition to this, 27,198 coffee
circumcisions and 11 ,323 coffee
renewals were done so far aimed at
improving the country’s coffee
plantations’ production and
productivity.
He indicated that lack of
experienced coffee plantation experts
in the area has been a big obstacle
in unlocking the country’s potentials
in the sector. But, now the authority
is working in collaboration with
universities and agriculture colleges
to advance the sector with competent
manpower specialized with coffee,
tea and spices.
The EU is the leading Ethiopian
market accounting for 60 percent of
coffee export while Germany, Saudi
Arabia, USA, Japan and Belgium
are among the major destinations. In
the effort to improve Ethiopian coffee
farmers’ productivity, the EU Coffee
Action ET/FED/038-977 Project that
would be active for two years signed
to fund fifteen million Euros for the
farmers which is a plus to promote
the country’s coffee earning.
Generally, the country earns 571
million USD exporting 1 67,478
million tons of coffee, tea and spices.
In order to be competitive in the
world coffee market; the country is
working strenuously on coffee quality
inspection and certification,
quarantine inspection and issuance
of standards certification for local
exporters through undertaking
successive supervisions, the director
recalled.
proper implementation of greenery
programs.
And the PATSPO project is hope
flickering in this regard. One of the
leading organizations (ICRAF) has
also worldwide experiences in forestry
with latest technologies and it has
also pledged to provide the
technologies to the local tree seed
providing companies. The promises
seem hopeful to the country, but needs
a strong commitment of stakeholders
for lasting solutions.