By Ronald Ssekandi
KAMPALA, July 28 (Xinhua) -- A strong coffee aroma engulfs as you approach Volcano Coffee kiosk at Forest Mall, a popular upmarket mall, housing supermarkets, banks and other offices.
The Volcano Coffee startup, run by Gerald Katabazi, focuses on specialty coffees especially Arabica coffee, grown on the volcanic Mount Elgon ranges in the eastern part of the country.
Coffee lovers from the different offices throng the kiosk to drink the beverage prepared in different forms. Some even carry it up to their offices as they work.
"I Am a lover of coffee, I cannot explain that feeling as to why I love coffee, I feel good every time I take it. I feel energized on days when I am down, a good cup of coffee will do," Sharon de Klonia-Isiagi, a social marketer told Xinhua.
Isiagi said on average she takes four cups of coffee a day, noting that she also uses coffee to do her facials and also in baking when she wants a coffee-flavored cake or cookies.
Besides Volcano Coffee, other local and international coffee shops are opening up especially in the capital Kampala, which has a growing middle class.
These coffee enthusiasts are among the population that consumes only 4-5 percent of the coffee produced in Uganda despite the country being the second largest producer of coffee in Africa after Ethiopia.
Uganda's less consumption of coffee is shrouded in a lot of mysteries among which include a colonial mentality that coffee was meant for export and the farmers only had to drink tea.
"That mindset was driven into different generations including ours. We have lived knowing that if we farm the coffee we are supposed to export it," Katabazi said.
"This is why we are saying, we must change the narrative. The consumption rate which is 4-5 percent is not healthy for the economy and the farmers," he added.
Volcano Coffee is using the coffee-kiosk-model to scale up the domestic consumption of coffee across the country. The startup set up an academy where it trains youths in the different value chains of coffee.
After graduating, the youths with support from the academy are encouraged to set up kiosks where they can sell coffee.
Katabazi said this model will create jobs in a country where majority of the youths who comprise 70 percent of the country's population are jobless.
"It is really picking up and it is one of the models we are telling our students here after graduating," Katabazi said, noting that this is one of the ways of getting young people into agriculture, which is the country's major economic activity.
He said one kilogram of coffee can produce 100 cups and if one cup of coffee costs 1 U.S. dollar that means one can earn 100 dollars.
"To a young person, this means money, that is why we are using the kiosk model to accelerate growth, targeting a certain age bracket in our society," he said.
Jackson Mugisha, a businessman and farmer told Xinhua that he grew up taking tea but had to change to coffee after discovering its advantage over tea.
"Without coffee, I don't think I would have that alertness the whole day because sometimes you can be worked out. When I started taking coffee, I discovered that it has benefits that I get that I cannot get from tea," he said.
"I think people should start taking coffee not only for the health benefit but also commercial because if we have many farmers who are into coffee farming, if we do not support them, if we don't become their market, then where are they going to sell their coffee. Why should we only look at exporting it when you have a big population here that can take coffee and you don't even need to export," he added.
Katabazi said that whereas Uganda is earning huge sums from coffee exports, the country also needs to develop its domestic market which is less likely to suffer from any global upsets like the COVID-19 pandemic.
Figures by the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA), a state-owned regulator of the sector, show that the country's exports for the last four financial years increased by 17 percent, to 4.17 million (60 kg) bags in financial year 2018-19 from 3.56 million bags in financial year 2015-16.
A government report released in May this year showed that the value of coffee exports increased by 18 percent to 416.2 million U.S. dollars in the financial year 2018-19 from 351.53 million U.S. dollars in the financial year 2015/16.
About 500,000 households in the country depend on coffee production, according to UCDA.
Beside the traditional coffee markets in Europe, Uganda is now looking at other markets for instance China to grow its export volumes. The east African country last year signed a cooperation agreement with China's Yunnan Coffee Exchange.
At the China International Specialty Coffee Expo that was scheduled in Yunnan Province in March this year, Uganda was supposed to be a portrait country where the country would highlight its coffee. The exposition, which was going to attract hundreds of exhibitors including coffee producers, equipment suppliers, roasters and financial services companies, was postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Enditem
