Rwanda's coffee authorities plan to hold regular competitions to reward farmers who produce top quality coffee, officials said on Wednesday.
The coffee board hopes the Cup of Excellence scheme would encourage peasant farmers to take proper care of their crop from the period of planting, harvesting and processing.
Many coffee-producing countries participate in such competitions where winning beans are sold on the Internet at sharply higher prices. "Our competition with the rest of the world's coffee producers cannot be based on quantity," Ephrem Niyosaba Director of Rwanda Coffee Board told Reuters.
"We can only compete on quality grounds." Last month, Rwanda's coffee board organised a coffee competition for 47 farmers last month in which farmers with better coffee grades were rewarded with farm equipment.
Rwanda, in the small league of African coffee producers, is banking on the specialty coffee market to boost revenues and help the industry recover after it suffered during the country's 1994 genocide.
Starbucks Corp, a leading U.S retailer of specialty coffee in the world sells Rwanda's coffee fully washed under its back apron exclusive label. Niyosaba said that by 2008, Rwanda will be exporting all its coffee in the fully washed category.
But currently only 2,800 tonnes out of the total 26,000 tonnes of coffee expected to be produced in 2006 will be fully washed. The impoverished nation has embarked on a campaign of setting up coffee washing stations across the country.
Rwanda's coffee officials expect earnings from coffee exports to increase by $18 million in 2006, to $50 million, compared with 2005, on higher output and stable world prices. Overall output will increase to 26,000 tonnes from 17,000 tonnes produced in the 2005. About 500,000 Rwandans are engaged in coffee farming on 33,000 hectares of land.
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