STiR coffee and tea magazine

52 STiR coffee and tea / Issue 3, 2017 (June/July) By Dan Bolton Kenya Shines The Integrated Coffee Productivity Initiative (ICPI) is a program to double Kenya's coffee produciton in five years Photo of coffee nursery courtesy Kenya Coffee Traders Association SEATTLE, Wash. Five years ago Kenya might have wilted under the intense scrutiny of the global spe- cialty coffee community. But Kenya shined during this year's trek to Seattle as the Global Specialty Coffee Expo's 2017 portrait country. On his return to Nairobi, agriculture cabinet secretary Willy Bett announced "we pushed for increased sales from the American roasters and they have already increased orders from what they currently buy." Kenya is a land of small holders with a rich agricultural tradition. There is effective outreach by government, a strong agricultural extension service, and well-respected coffee researchers along with active NGOs. The result of this effort, in combination with great soil, equatorial sun, predictable rainfall, and high-mountain terrain, is a medium-bodied, fruit-juicy coffee that specialty roasters find enticing. They like the fact that most of the washed coffee is hand processed to insure con- sistency and that beans are classified by bean size (AA-AB-C).Unique cultivars like SL- 28 and SL-34 (Bourbon stock) offer a lot of variety. The six distinct producing regions produce a pleasing range of quality arabica. While most of the annual harvest is used in blends, single-origin coffees, often purchased direct through a system of independent marketing agents, regularly score in the 90s on the SCAA cupping scale. In May Revel Coffee featured a Kenya Kabare AA that scored 96 and was selling online for $14.50 for 12oz. The challenge is not about growing good coffee, the challenge is growing more of it. Like many of the coffee-producing countries of East Africa, which 40 years ago produced more than a quarter of the world's coffee, Kenya has seen a decades-long decline in production. Africa today produces less than 15% of the world's coffee. That is now about to change and Kenya is leading the way. Myth or reality David Kandagor a soil scientist at the University of Nairobi representing the Kenya Coffee Directorate, told expo attendees that Kenya intends to double its coffee pro- duction within five years. In his graduate thesis he discovered farm performance was about 34% of the achievable optimum of 1.3 metric tons per hectare. "Myth or reality," he said, confronting the audience. He then quickly dispelled any lingering doubts by detailing how the country is approaching this task. About 67% of the country's coffee is produced by small holders in cooperatives. There are 700,000 growers, accounting for 60% of production but few are earning a living. Large estates make up the remainder which is almost exclusively for export.

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