Uganda exported 340,378 bags of coffee weighing 60-kg each in September, up from 169,728 bags in the same month last year, a source at the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) said on Friday. The rise was due to good rains and to exporters clearing warehouses of old stock to make room for the new crop.
"Farmers and exporters are clearing their warehouses of old stocks to create room for a new crop and that explains the huge jump in exports. Also the crop in the second half of this coffee year (October-September) matured under sufficient rains which made it good," the source said.
South and south-western Uganda account for 45 percent of Uganda's annual coffee production while central and the eastern parts of the country account for the rest. Uganda, which mainly cultivates robusta, is Africa's leading exporter of the beans and their earnings are a major source of foreign exchange. It forecasts it will export 3 million bags in the 2011/2012 (October-September) season.
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