The Performance of Ethiopia’s Main Coffee Value Chain Actors during the COVID-19 Pandemic

We conducted cascading phone surveys to assess the performance of Ethiopia’s main coffee value chain actors during the COVID-19 pandemic. In general, the coffee value chain actors in Ethiopia appear to have been resilient to the pandemic, despite disruptions. The share of coffee farmers who adopt good agricultural practices, received services (e.g., extension and credit), and composition of their coffee buyers remains largely comparable before and during the pandemic. The majority of coffee farmers also reported an increase on volume of coffee produced and income. Similarly, the vast majority of coffee traders and processors reported that coffee supply in 2020 was the same or higher than in 2019, and they obtained same or more profit in 2020. For these upstream actors (farmers and local traders), notable effects of the pandemic were identified only on labor availability, which was caused primarily by movement restrictions due to the pandemic and fear of contracting the virus. Coffee exporters, on the other hand, were relatively adversely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, mainly because Ethiopia’s peak export or shipment period coincided with the start of lockdown restrictions in most coffee importing countries, which resulted in canceled or postponed contracts during the early stages of the pandemic