Uganda coffee farmers have been engaging in value addition beyond simply picking cherries by adopting better harvesting techniques, proper drying methods, wet processing, hulling, and even roasting.
However, there is a unique opportunity for the coffee farmers across the country to benefit from coffee flowers by adding value to them. This is already happening in a few selected districts under a two-year pilot project run by Pan African Trade and Development Group (PAD and T), a company dealing in agribusiness inputs with support from the German Cooperation.
Background
Uganda’s coffee sector is characterised by a government-driven National Coffee Roadmap targeting 20 million bags by 2030, with a strong emphasis on increasing production through planting new trees. Now, farmers are encouraged to take on more active roles in the coffee value chain through education and support for quality management. The focus is shifting from exporting raw beans to processing and value-added products to fetch higher prices for farmers.
Also, the emphasis in value addition has shifted beyond primary production by exploring and promoting value addition through products such as roasted coffee products, processing coffee oil from raw beans, cosmetics such as coffee lotions, creams and shampoos and beverages like coffee malt, energy drinks, beer and wine. However, farmers have not been sensitised to add value to the coffee flowers. This led the (PAD and T) team to come up with a project concept with a focus on sensitising females involved in the coffee value chain.
Coffee flower processing
Ms Rikke Adamsen, founder of the project, explained that two years ago, her team at PAD and T set out on a journey of turning coffee flower into high-quality products. Apart from the already trained 10,000 farmers, mainly in the Greater Masaka, the team intends to reach out to farmers across the country, mainly to push a female-driven value chain. This is through a co-creation model that bridges research, entrepreneurship and technology involving the Danish private companies, leading selected academic universities and local partners, the National Crops Resources Research Institute and Food for Africa.
The team sampled coffee dried flowers by testing them in a laboratory, including testing how long they can be preserved. She notes that coffee flowers, unlike any other flower, have rich flavours, minerals, antioxidants and Vitamins A, B, C, D and E, which are essential for the human body. The team then trained female farmers on how to collect quality coffee flowers, which, after drying, can be used for processing beverages, oil, soft drinks, beer, chocolates and premium cosmetics. These products do not exist in the global market, which means it takes enormous effort, creativity and strength to open the doors for export.
The emphasis is on farmers to deliver the highest quality of coffee flowers in order to come up with quality products. The team is already in touch with the Carlsberg Group, manufacturers of Carlsberg beer, who are willing to take up processed coffee flowers to come up with a new beer product which they can sell in the global market. The team has also tasted the processed coffee flower with Champagne producers in France and world-class chocolate producers. Their response was that this can become a premium global product.
How to harvest the coffee flower, the selling process
Mark Grace Kiyiga, the logistics manager at PAD and T, explains that the team for the last two years reached out to farmers in Greater Masaka, Iganga and Kawanda, among others, sensitising them on how to pick the flowers. Farmers are advised to harvest the flower after 4-5 days of flowering because the coffee berry would have already formed. This is to enable harvesting of quality flowers because once it overstays, the flowers change colour and it becomes unwanted, yet the aim is not to allow flowers to drop in the farm and get wasted.