The ECTA reported increased coffee productivity for the 2022–23 harvest.
Fekadu Adefris, Chief Officer of Coffee, Tea, and Spice Development at the Authority, reported that great attention has been given to increasing coffee yield and productivity. In achieving this, numerous projects have been implemented, with an emphasis on replacing old coffee trees. Fekadu reported that nationwide coffee restoration work has been carried out since 2019 on 392,000 hectares of coffee plantations. He also pointed out that restoration is currently underway on 135,911 hectares of coffee plantations. The other major program underway by the authority includes expanding coffee plantations in areas where coffee production is uncommon. These major programs have added greater value to the current 2022–23 harvest, reaching more than 761,000 MT, up by 26% compared to 2021–22’s harvest.
While the 2022–23 harvest volume has shown increments, export volume has shown declines for peak months of sales. Despite improvement in May 2023 exports compared to April 2023's 27,000 MT, May’s 2023 volume remains the lowest compared to the sales of the past 3 years.
The Kafa and Bench Sheko sub-regions announced that more than 76 million coffee seedlings will be planted.
The Southern Western Ethiopia Region produces one of Ethiopia’s greater coffee collections, such as Keffa and Benchi. The region’s major coffee-growing sub-regions (zones) include Bench Sheka, Dawro, Konta, and Sheka. Among these coffee-growing sub-regions, Bench Sheka constitutes the largest catchment area with over 127355.5 ha of land.
According to the latest announcement from the Kafa sub-region’s Agriculture Department, 13.5 million coffee seedlings have been planted through the last 2 weeks of May. The Head of Agriculture, Mr.Gao Abamecha Gao, reported 42 million coffee seedlings will be planted by mid-July 2023. The neighboring Bench Sheka sub-region’s Agriculture Department Head, Mr. Mesfen Gubla, reported the ongoing program of planting 24 million coffee seedlings by the end of August 2023. According to Mesfin, the first phase will be completed by planting 9 million seedlings by mid-July, following the good rains the region will continue to receive in the weeks to come.
