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Tanzania Coffee Board, the official auctioneer, and growers are required to sell their produce only through farmers’ co-operatives. The selling of coffee directly from farms has been banned
Deputy Minister for Agriculture, Tanzania David Silinde has insisted on the government mission to ensure a good market for vanilla and coffee, a move that aims at curbing crop smuggling. He said the coffee and vanilla business is now through auctioning and that the government is doing everything in its power to look for investors who will be able to set up a processing factory for value addition.
According to Mr Silinde, the factories will help growers to get better prices for their produce. He said the government has also instructed coffee growers and cooperatives to sell the coffee through official auctioneers expressing its commitment to stop smuggling.
Tanzania Coffee Board, the official auctioneer, and growers are required to sell their produce only through farmers’ co-operatives. The selling of coffee directly from farms has been banned. Thus, coffee farmers and co-operatives in the country have started selling their produce only through the annual coffee auctions and in return benefit from the growing global coffee market. This stops the rampant coffee smuggling to neighboring countries by individual growers.
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Twenty-three dealers and three AMCOS were granted permission to buy dry cherry and certified coffee in the Kagera Region in the 2023/24 auctioning season. Coffee regulations in Tanzania are undergoing major changes which are intended to improve profits for farmers and extend their role in the supply chain.
The government has banned the purchase of cherry or parchment at the farm-gate level. Farmers must now sell cherry or parchment to an Agricultural Marketing Cooperative Society (AMCOS), which will deliver the coffees to auction for purchase. Coffees, then, will be traceable to the AMCOS.
