African youth urged to embrace coffee business sector

By Elias Hakizimana.

African youth especially Rwandans are encouraged to join coffee business sector from farming to the whole value chain in order to boost export produce.

The message was delivered on Friday, February 17, 2023, by Gilbert Gatali, a coffee businessman and chairman of coffee exporters association of Rwanda and the AFCA acting Executive Director during the closure of the 19th African Fine Coffees Conference and exhibition conducted in Kigali, the 3^rd of its kind in Rwanda.

Gatali said that issue of youth and young people to be less involved within the coffee sector especially in farming is still a problem, not only in Rwanda, but also in a lot of other countries.

“We don’t have a lot of young people who are involved in farming, we have old trees and old farmers, I think there is a lot of work that need to be done in sensitizing them to see the benefits of getting into the coffee business, and it is important to highlight that it is also not an easy thing to do because most of young people want to move to the city, and do different jobs apart from farming which they consider unexciting,” he said.

He added that the aspect of coffee is becoming exciting like value added, giving an example of coffee baristas, where a lot of young people are embracing this profession.

“Showing how people can prepare good coffee makes others excited and start thinking of where that coffee is coming from, I think, the way to start involving young people isn’t always by starting at the farm, you can start by the youth who are ready for the value added part of the coffee and then get them to move back towards the farm because now they are the ones  to link farming and the end-product,” Gatali noted.

He embarks on some stereotypes based on youth childhood history where they used to see their parents-growing coffee and think that farmers live a difficult life and without money, which is a misconception. 

He also said that processing part can motivate young people to get involved in coffee business. He recommends business operators in the sector to give opportunity to the youth to tape into the value addition activities and explore the benefits of this cash crop commodity.

Awarding barista champions

The 19th African Fine Coffees Conference and exhibition (AFCA2023) was concluded with a ceremony to award various champions in the coffee sector, including baristas.

Gatali said that giving young people around the world, the chance to embrace coffee value chain, organize competitions such as baristas and encourage local consumption would increase production and value.

“I think it is great because baristas tend to not be remembered in the coffee sector, people go to the coffee shops and say “give me cappuccino, give me latex,” while they do not really understand that the person making that coffee has gone to school to study that, invested money to learn how to prepare coffee, and so they are not valued the way they should be valued,” he explained.

Gatali said that doing barista competition is meaningful, as it adds value to this profession as not only the skill that is important, but the skill that needs to be rewarded, appreciated and taken into account.

He recommends for further awareness campaigns to mobilize young people from Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya and the rest of the continent to be involved in coffee sector.

Message to Coffee exporters

Gatali tipped coffee exporters on professionalism as they work with many people in the sector.

“Coffee touches a lot of peoples’ lives, when you are exporter it means you work with many coffee farmers, people working in ware houses, in logistics and quality control people, so, the message should be how do we maintain professionalism within the coffee sector, how do we ensure that we understand the market, how do we maintain the quality so that we can compete at international markets, and how do we respect different people within the chain, especially the farmers,” he said.

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