APA-Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) Ethiopia’s coffee export fell short of its annual target, generating more than $1.3 billion in the last Ethiopian fiscal year which ended on July 7, 2023.
The Ethiopian Coffee and Tea Authority (ECTA) Wednesday disclosed that the country shipped 240,000 tons of coffee to the international market to secure $1.3 billion.
“Both the volume and revenue were significantly less than the targets the authority had planned for 300,000 tons and $1.8 billion respectively.
In his press briefing, ECTA’s Deputy Director Shafi Omar cited global headwinds as a major reason for the less satisfactory performance.
Last fiscal year, Ethiopia had enjoyed favorable prices and exported 300,000 tons of coffee to earn record $1.4 billion.
This time, Shafi noted, “coffee brought relatively close revenue to the record income that was earned last year despite a significant drop in volume.”
He said the price of coffee as brought down in the international market, attributing the decline to a drop in demand from buying nations which have already faced economic downturn.
Security problems in some major coffee-growing areas of Ethiopia also caused the coffee supply to drop.
Saudi Arabia, Germany, the USA, Korea, Japan, Belgium, and UAE have been the major destinations for Ethiopian coffee in the past twelve months.
Coffee supports the livelihoods of more than a quarter of the over 120 million Ethiopian population and generates up to 30 percent of the country’s foreign exchange earnings.
MG/abj/APA