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Kenya: Erratic Weather Could Dent Coffee Gains
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Business Daily (Nairobi)
18 November 2007
Posted to the web 18 November 2007
Solomon Mburu
Erratic weather is expected to claim about a fifth of Kenya's coffee production this year, keeping prices above average levels.
The anticipated fall in volumes has increased demand for Kenyan coffee, pushing auction prices to as high as $200 for a 50kg bag of high quality coffee.
"When there is less supply, prices are likely to move up as dealers compete for the little that is available," said Mr Bernard Gichovi, the Coffee Board of Kenya production manager.
"The rains have been good, but they have not been consistent with the crop's flowering pattern," said Mr Richard Wahome, the Mt Kenya region coffee board manager.
According to Mr Wahome, heavy rains early in the year caused poor flowering since coffee requires periods of no moisture during the early stages of flowering. Mr James Minae, the acting head of research liaison at the Coffee Research Foundation, said a lot of moisture during the early stage of flowering makes the crop susceptible to diseases.
He said the most critical stage of flowering are the months of April and May when the crop requires a lot of rain for rapid growth of the young flowers.
Between June and July, the newly formed beans require moisture. Later in August and September, they require a dry spell for hardening in readiness for ripening and harvesting which starts in October, said Mr Minae.
Changes in weather patterns have affected this cycle, leading to an expected reduction of 20 per cent in production compared to last year's output of 49,000 tonnes.
The changing climatic patterns are as a result of global warming caused by pollution and deforestation in the country.
According Mr Wahome, the expected drop in production may wipe out gains made in terms of improved husbandry by farmers. Having been freed from earlier debts and being provided with fresh funds through the Coffee Development Fund, farmers have returned to their farms with increased vigour resulting in improved quantity and quality of production.
"Farmers have been doing a good job and coffee is very green and healthy but the flowering has been poor," said Wahome.
However, experts say that improved prices may help to cushion them against heavy loss.
Millers say that the low production will lead to underutilisation of the country's combined milling capacity which stands at around 200,000 metric tonnes.
Marketing agents who have been building their capacity since they were licensed last year are also expected to experience underutilisation of their capacity.
Reduced production also means that the country will get fewer returns from the crop compared to other coffee producing countries.
The long-term solution for the problem, said Mr Gichovi, will be in planting coffee varieties that are resistant to extreme weather changes and diseases such as coffee berry disease.
"Varieties like Ruiru 11 are good and if farmers can plant it then it will be possible to hedge the industry from such losses," he said.
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Players in the industry have challenged CRF to come up with more resistant varieties that can thrive even in the dry coffee growing areas.
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