Building Capacity in Coffee Certification and Verification for Specialty Coffee Farmers in Eastern Africa (CFC/ICO/45)

The rationale of the project is to build certification and verification capacity within the national institutions. Ultimately the project purpose will be to increase the quality and quantity of certified / verified coffee produced and processed within the EAFCA region through training of master trainers, trainer of trainers, certifiers / verifiers (auditors) and farmers. The process of building capacity for good agricultural practices and sustainable production will lead to socially acceptable, environmentally friendly and economically successful coffee production among producers. The project is tailored to enhance coffee productivity and quality in order to have viable access to premium markets upstream. The 6030 farmers trained in the project have their coffee certified with respect to the various certification schemes being applied in the project countries. To this end, a multiple certification approach is being employed to provide the beneficiary farmers with access to market options and better terms of trade. Multiple certification capabilities provide farmers with leverage to switch market options for better terms of trade. The concept does not emphasize better prices but market options. In addition existing new and emerging coffee sustainability initiatives will improve market efficiency, raise value addition in production and processing and ensure improved coordination between coffee producers and final coffee market. 

The implementation of project activities was quite successful so far. The sequence of training activities being pursued in the project entail training of master trainers, training of auditors, and trainer-of-trainers and farmers. The training activities specifically targeted institutional capacity for certification and verification through training of professional certifiers and verifiers. In this regard, the project implementation process involved written agreements with the nine National Coffee Institutions (NCIs) and identification of project beneficiaries. The precursor to the training process was the development of the training manuals which have been completed and culminated into the training of master trainers and on-going trainer-of-trainers training. Under the EU All ACP Agricultural Commodities Programme 86 coffee certification professionals were trained, including 39 master trainers, 18 auditors/certifiers and 30 trainer-of-trainers. Each NCI has initiated its own farmer training programme. Further information can be obtained from the website www.eafca.org.