Coffee farmers advised to form cooperative societies

Business
Source:
The National,Tuesday June 28th, 2016

COFFEE farmers have been urged to form cooperative societies so that they can maximise their returns from the agriculture produce.
Villagers living in the Fayantina local level government in Henganofi district, Eastern Highlands were relayed the message during the launching of their cooperative group.
Coffee Industry Corporation (CIC) provincial farmer, training and extension coordinator Samson Jack encouraged locals to get back to their coffee gardens and support the Kunepa Cooperative to increase production, improve quality and access better markets.
He said they must form cooperative groups so they could be assisted by the Government and others. The Kunepa Ensign Coffee Cooperative Society is a community-based group at Kunepa village.
Coffee is produced by more than 50 cooperative members and has the potential to produce between 15 to 20 tonnes green bean coffee per annum.
CIC general manager Steven Tumae stressed the need for youths to get involved in coffee and treat it as a business.
“Kunepa is now the business arm for coffee in Fayantina so you must all work together to take this group to a level where your hard work will improve your livelihoods”, he added.
Cooperative chairman Felix Oveasa said Kunepa wanted to see Fayantina people return to tend to their coffee gardens instead of loitering in towns.
Kunepa is one of the progressing groups under CIC’s extension programmes which had proved its potential to be in top five producers in the 2014 national coffee cupping competition.

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