Nyeri County explores agri-tourism to market its coffee

Nyeri,

Friday, October 6, 2023

KNA by Wangari Mwangi

As the coffee sub-sector continues to grapple with shake-ups that have seen the Nairobi Coffee Exchange (NCE) continue to record dismal performance in the last two months, players in the coffee sector in Nyeri have decided to explore agri-tourism as the new frontier to sell their coffee.

Agri-tourism is a form of commercial enterprise that links agricultural production and processing with tourism to attract visitors into an agricultural business for the purposes of entertaining and educating the visitors while generating income for the farmer.

The county is gearing to host the Nyeri International Coffee Expo(NICE) which is set to take place between November 5 to November 11.The expo which has been dubbed “Nyeri Coffee Origin Trip” will act as the first ever linkage that will see coffee buyers from 20 countries interact directly with 5,000 coffee farmers from Nyeri county.

According to the NICE managing director, Simon Mburu, the visiting buyers will have a chance to visit coffee estates to familiarize themselves with the coffee harvesting process. They are also set to visit coffee mills for a firsthand experience on how the cherry is converted to parchment. To top it all up, Mburu noted that the participants will have an opportunity to sample the different coffee aromas that Nyeri has to offer during the cupping exercise before transacting business directly with the farmers.

“We have confirmed 20 coffee buyers from Germany, United Kingdom, United States, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, South Africa and Turkey and all these people are coming to meet the farmers and do business with them,” stated Mburu.

“Our goal is to have several contracts signed between the farmers and the buyers. To help the farmer with the negotiations process, we are working with logistics companies, financial institutions for those who may require pre-financing. We have also brought on board coffee liquorers to help the farmers set and negotiate the prices,” he added.

The county is a renowned producer of specialized coffee yielding grades AA, AB, BB and C with an annual production of close to 6,000 tonnes of coffee annually. Mburu noted that the inaugural expo will solve the marketing issues that have continued to bedevil coffee farmers by facilitating direct access to the buyer.

“The coffee farmer has many challenges but the biggest one is how to get the coffee to the market. We haven’t been able to do so for many years, we have been taken advantage of by middlemen so for the first time, the farmer is now welcoming buyers on their own. The expo will bring a shift from ‘taking the coffee to the market’ to ‘bringing the buyer to the farm’,” he added.

Speaking in his office when signed the memorandum of understanding with NICE to enable planning and pilot implementation of the Nyeri Coffee Origin Trip, Nyeri Governor Mutahi Kahiga lauded the organizers for their ingenuity. Kahiga said that the expo was a remarkable step towards ensuring that “money goes to the pockets of coffee farmers.”

He at the same time reiterated his commitment to implementing interventions which he said will increase coffee production thus giving the county a better bargaining chip at the coffee trade market. Kahiga also challenged farmers to work towards increasing their produce from the current two kilogram per coffee bush to 10 kilograms per coffee bush adding that with bigger volumes farmers would be better placed to set better prices for their produce and attract direct sales by foreign buyers.

“When you have the volumes and you are better organized you will be able to dictate the price. We must also change this idea of taking the coffee to the consumer and start bringing the consumer to the coffee so that at the end of the day the farmer is able to deliver coffee to the factory when they already know how much they will earn,” said governor Kahiga.   

Courtesy; KNA