Page 52 - #45 English

Culture

Article/Photos: Maja Wallengren

It’s hard to imagine a world without
coffee. But had it not been for the Ethio-
pians at some point over 1000 years ago
deciding that they actually liked this stuff,
coffee as we know it might never have
reached the world market. Even more
exciting to coffee lovers and industry
stakeholders today is that in the last five
years Africa’s biggest coffee producer
has gotten even bigger and the volumes
reaching export markets across the world
Ethiopia are steadily expanding. In the first of a spe-
cial new four-part series by Tea & Coffee
Trade Journal’s veteran coffee writer, Maja
Wallengren, takes an in-depth look at the
growth of Ethiopia’s coffee industry and
Production is Growing what the latest efforts from new market
policies and an ambitious renovation plan
Again in the Birthplace mean for its future. Yet, it’s all good news
as production from the “origin of all origins
of Coffee of coffee” is on the path to reach between
9 and 10 million bags in coming years.
In coffee, it’s really all about Ethio-
pia. This is where the story of coffee starts
after the Coffea Arabica plant was first
discovered growing in the wild some time
between the 6th and 8th centuries, most
historians agree. And it is from Ethiopia
that the production and trade of coffee
spread throughout the world. From indus-
try officials to coffee enthusiasts, the story
and history of Ethiopia is one that con-
tinues to fascinate coffee lovers. Thanks
to the discovery of coffee in Ethiopia in
what was then known as Abyssinia, coffee
was brought to the world and as such the
trade of coffee might even be considered
the foundation of the earliest interaction
of what today constitutes globalization.
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