Building Research Capacity Essential to Enhance Ethiopia’s Coffee Productivity: EIAR

Enhancing capacity of research undertaking is critically important to increase the production and productivity of coffee, Director of Crop at the Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research (EIAR) said.

Addressing a workshop on driving innovation for the future of coffee in Ethiopia held in Addis Ababa today, Director of Crop at EIAR, Taye Tadesse said that despite the origin of coffee, Ethiopia has not benefited enough from the sector compared to its ample potential.

The discussion among stakeholders targeted at resolving the challenges in the research system, and undertake effective researches which can increase coffee production and productivity in the country, he noted.

Highlighting that the challenges of the sector have been identified, the director said the next step is to focus on what interventions should be taken to alleviate the impact of climate change, which is one of the biggest challenges in the sector.

To resolve such challenges and increase production and productivity, he added boosting the capacity of research undertaking is critically important. For the director, the support of donors is also pivotal to overcome the emerging challenges in the sector.

Ethiopian Coffee and Tea Authority Director-General, Adugna Debela noted that drawing experiences of various countries in the coffee sector and understand the status of Ethiopia is one of the objectives of the meeting.

For the Director General, gaining the lessons from the success of others in the sector is vital to increase production and productivity of Ethiopia’s coffee.

Stating that there has been lack of coffee breeding in Ethiopia, he said supporting the sector with sufficient research will be crucial to realize breeding programs in Ethiopian coffee.

World Coffee Research Asian and African Director Kraig Kraft said for his part that increasing the productivity of existing coffee farms is crucial for Ethiopian coffee.

“The solution we are putting forward is to figure out how you can increase the productivity of existing coffee farms and existing coffee farmers.”

Stating that there is a demand to produce more coffee, he said “It needs to take care and respect the natural environment”.

Ethiopia is the birthplace of coffee Arabica and contains nearly a fifth of all coffee farms around the world.

Coffee is also critical to Ethiopia’s economy, generating 24 percent of the nation’s export income.

Source: Ethiopian News Agency