Uganda To Streamline Coffee Exports

Uganda is looking to streamline the process for exporting coffee as the country looks to increased export volumes more than four-fold, from 4.6 million 60kg coffee bags annually to 20 million. It remains the country’s leading agricultural export commodity, with Uganda currently the second largest exporter on the African continent after Ethiopia. 

The proposed measures to try and improve the process are contained within the National Coffee Bill 2018, which is being scrutinised by the Parliamentary Committee on Agriculture. They include the introduction of new requirements for grower registration, the assessment of plots by the Uganda Coffee Development Authority, and the introduction of a coffee auction. 

However, it has already attracted opposition from some quarters as a result of concerns that the requirement for registration could see small scale farmers pushed out.  In its current format the bill makes the registration of all commercial farmers with more than 50 trees mandatory. 

Those to have voiced such concerns include the National Agricultural Research Organisation and the National Coffee Research Institute.

Of the country’s estimated 1.7 million households engaged in the sector only around 2 per cent are considered to be large scale.