‘Neglect’ of coffee industry results in exports revenue decline from $1.4 billion to $34,000

Revenue in exports from coffee for the year 2018 was $34,000.

This is according to President of the Coffee Federation of Ghana (CFG), Chief Nat Ebo Nsarko.

The $34,000 export revenue recorded for 2018 stands in sharp contrast for the an export revenue of $1.4 billion in 2016.

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Coffee export revenue for 2015 was $3,000, in 2016 it went as high as $1.4 billion and fell to $55,000 in 2017 and then to $34,000 in 2018,” stated Mr Nsarko in an interview.

“So you can see that we have been struggling, whereas other African countries are doing very well and contributing hugely to their GDP, Ghana does only about 0.2 per cent of GDP,” he added.

The federation has lamented over government’s reluctance to invest in the production of the crop as well as its entire value chain although it requires minimum capital to do so.

Meanwhile, the President in April 2019, launched the Planting for Export and Rural Development (PERD), an initiative meant to further boost the revival of the country’s economic growth through the agricultural sector, especially, the production of cash crops like coffee for exports.

The federation lauding the initiative noted that PERD is a good spring board to mainstream Ghana’s cash crop trading, including coffee – a crop which has taken the center stage as the hottest commodity on the world market in recent times.

PERD is designed to focus on the development of selected export tree crops namely cashew, coffee, oil palm, coconut, mango and rubber, and also present to Ghana opportunities for exports diversification and new sources of revenue.

Source: Norvanreports.com