Col. Loti Dradria Osutre, the Coordinator of Operation Wealth Creation for Arua City, said that Arua City is 401.8 square kilometers, of which about 393 square kilometers is rural and ideal for the cultivation of coffee.
Leaders in Arua City have been asked to mobilize farmers to grow more coffee, boosting their income and improving their livelihood.
In October, the government stressed the need to promote coffee growing in northern Uganda, so that the country can reach its goal of producing 20 million bags of coffee by 2030.
In 2015, Uganda planned to export 20 million 60-kilogram bags by 2020 and later deferred the deadline to 2022. However, production still stands at less than the ambitious target.
Robinson Draga, the Arua City Agriculture Officer, said that besides the government’s call to farmers in northern Uganda to commercialize coffee growing, the city is also striving to identify a cash crop which it will be known for.
Statistics from the Arua City Agriculture Department, show that when Arua City gained its status in 2021, it had 1,197 coffee farmers who planted around 136,094 coffee seedlings. In 2022, the number of coffee farmers increased to 1,212 farmers who planted 14,000 coffee seedlings.
“This is a great trend for us. We want to take it to the higher level so that we can identify ourselves with a value crop, and contribute to the national economy,” Draga said.
Godwin Amege, the West Nile Region Coffee Extension Officer at Uganda Coffee Development Authority, UCDA, encouraged those already growing coffee and those intending to join the venture, to organize themselves in groups, to easily get markets.
Amege revealed that many coffee farmers in the sub-region are not yet benefitting from coffee because they are not organized, which forces farmers to sell individually to intermediaries, cheaply.
He said the tons of coffee produced in Arua City, Maracha, and Koboko districts are unknown because the farmers are not organized.
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Amege explained that one does not need a huge chunk of land to start growing coffee, saying only 15 coffee trees can earn a farmer more than 500,000 Shillings a season, if well managed.
“We will say that we are in cities but we don't need a lot of land to plant coffee. It is just management practices that are dragging us behind,” Amege said, adding, “And yet if you go to Central people are earning a lot of money. You rarely see grass-thatched houses because they are getting money from coffee.”
Col. Loti Dradria Osutre, the Coordinator of Operation Wealth Creation for Arua City, said that Arua City is 401.8 square kilometres, of which about 393 square kilometres is rural and ideal for the cultivation of coffee.
Col. Loti revealed that West Nile is ideal for both Robusta and Arabica types of Coffee and urged farmers to consult the extension workers to guide them on which type and variety to grow.
He also asked coffee farmers to embrace good farming practices to get high-quality coffee and stop dealing with middlemen who purchase produce cheaply and make millions at the end of the coffee value chain.
George Ayo Ogwal, the Arua City Development Officer, said farmers intending to venture into coffee growing should use the time between now and January to dig the coffee holes, which will be used to determine the number of seedlings each farmer will get, upon verification.
Ogwal urged the extension workers to be exemplary by planting at least half an acre of coffee, and be aggressive in the campaign to commercialize coffee production in the city.
Statistics show that between August 2023 to July 2024, Uganda produced 6.3 million 60kg bags of coffee worth USD1.25bn.
