Quality and value chain analyses of Ethiopian coffee

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to analyze the quality and value chain of Ethiopian coffee in a way to identify opportunities that maximize the benefits from the sector. First the Ethiopian coffee sector is overviewed and then analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively starting from the crop up to the cup based on data collected from secondary sources. As a result, in spite of the comparative advantage in flavor, the Ethiopian green coffee price in the international market is lower than other countries’ price. In addition, actors are not fairly priced because of quality and value addition. The causes for poor quality are mainly associated with harvesting and post-harvesting practice including collection, dry and wet processing, storage and transportation. The value chain actors will play a critical role to increases the profit plow back in the Ethiopian coffee sector and then will significantly improve living standards of the poor who are at the source of the chain.

Key words – Coffee, Quality, Value addition