Coffee Olympic, to benefit smallholders

BY LAKACHEW ATINAFU

As the most known human history, agriculture is the fundamental endeavor for the existence of human being. Such primary economic activity has employed millions of lives in the third world. Ever since hunter gatherer to the recent sedentary farming, people deal their lives in engaging in the sector.

However, be it as it may, the international stock market has been tempting the sector particularly smallholder beneficiaries because of brokers and there is no clear distinction between commodity and specialty products.

Thanks to Brazil that introduce the Cup of Excellence, the most prestigious coffee competition that aims to benefit smallholders, the Ethiopian Coffee exporters Association funded by USAID Ethiopia took the initiative to host the ‘Oscar Of the Coffee World’ Which is formally Known as the Cup of Excellence (CoE).

Ethiopia has staged the CoE a year before. Though the competition has not been held under normal procedure due to the outbreak of COVID-19, it benefited the winner to sell Ethiopian coffee at staggering price. A cup of coffee was sold at a cost of 65 USD in London.

Seble Tewoldebirhan, Public Relations Manager at USAID’s Feed the Future Ethiopia Value Chain Activity, told The Ethiopian Herald that the country is home to various specialty coffee of Harar, Yirga Chefee, Limu, Jimma, Wolega, Sidama, Bebeka among others traceable coffee.

Last Year, the top scoring coffee in the year’s Cup of Excellence sold at a staggering price of 185.10 USD (6,293Birr) per pound, or 407 USD (13,838 Birr) per kilogram to Maruyama Coffee Co. Ltd from Japan. This is the highest price ever recorded for Ethiopian coffee.

According to Seble, this year which the country is going to host for the second time, efforts are underway to select the top 150 samples of coffee by devising mechanisms to avoid proximity and closeness in a bid to avoid the spread of the recent pandemic.

Seble further said that the cupping process is blind cupping by which every coffee grower can take part and the result is left to the international judges.

This inspired smallholders to work vigorously and to obtain the rewards they deserve from the sector and might be a great step to promote the Ethiopian wild and organic coffee.

The coffee samples of this year’s Cup of Excellence have surpassed that of the previous year by 400, disclosed the Ethiopian Coffee Exporters Association (ECEA).

In an exclusive interview with The Ethiopian Herald, Gizat Worku, ECEA General Manager said that over 1,800 coffee samples have been submitted to participate in this year’s Cup of Excellence Competition surpassing the 1,400 samples recorded last year.

Cup of Excellence stated that more than 1,800 samples have been collected from Addis Ababa, Dire Dawa, Hawassa and Jimma sample stations within a week. As to him, the number of contestants is also greater than that of the previous years.

It was also said that the contest is expected to be announced on April 13, 2021, and the winners will sell their coffee at a surprising price.

The winner of the last year competition had sold a kilogram of Ethiopia’s best coffee at a cost of 407 USD in the international market. As a result, many coffee farmers and growers will benefit and be motivated to produce better quality, it was said.

As a country and a coffee exporting association, the main issue is not to ensure the benefit of a few farmers, but most farmers need to work hard to improve coffee quality. Gizat added that coffee growers should be able to sell their products at an attractive price and improvements should be made to enhance the quality of Ethiopian coffee as a whole.

The Coffee Exporters’ Association has been participating in the project ranging from awareness creation to coffee pruning campaign. Evidence shows that the coffee sample size for the Cup of Excellence competition is the highest within 20 years.

As the result of the preceding year, coffee from Nigusie Gemeda of Sidama, SNNPS received the highest price. The US company coffee at Intelligentsia bought the second highest coffee that belongs to Rumudamo Coffee PLC from Sidama at 108 USD (3672 Birr) per pound. The third highest price went to Testi Trading PLC at 66.60 USD (2264 Birr) per pound sold to black Gold Coffee CO. Ltd from Taiwan The Cup of Excellence has been well accomplished though the world has been struck by a global pandemic COVID-19. Some part of Specialty Coffee Competition, aimed at benefiting smallholders, has got its end in the United States due to the risk of COVID-19 though it was scheduled to be fully held in Addis Ababa.

The Ethiopian Coffee Tea Authority and Alliance for Coffee Excellence with USAID’s Feed the Future Ethiopia Value Chain Activity support brought the renowned coffee competition Cup of Excellence for the first time to Ethiopia in 2020.

The Competition in Ethiopia was kicked off in September 2019 with awareness raising workshop and invitation of coffee farmers to submit their samples.

The first round of the completion was held in Addis Ababa in a new state-of –the-art of coffee lab. A jury of 17 Ethiopian cuppers and a head judge from the US choose the top 150 coffee that would move onto the second stage of the completion.

However due to COVID-19 and subsequent travel and logistic restriction, the organizers sent the sample to the Alliance for Coffee Excellence Head Quarter in Portland, Oregon. The international jury there selected 40 finalist coffees.

The 40 samples were then sent to three countries (the UK, US and Brazil) to six renowned international cuppers.

Those panel of experts had selected 28 coffee samples that scored 87 and above as the winners of Cup of Excellence of Ethiopia. Out of the 28, the coffee scored above 90 named Presidential Winner. The 11 coffee scoring between 85 were awarded National Winner title by the jury.

The Ethiopian Herald March 5/2021

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