A coffee society in Murang’a has employed strategies to increase production of the coffee focusing at fetching better prices at the market.
The Gatagua Farmers’ Cooperative Society produces 520,000 kilogrammes up from 78,000 kilogrammes five years ago with focus to reclaim its lost glory of production of more than 1.5 million kilogrammes annually.
During the farmers education day, the society chairman Mr Harrison Chege said the strategies to be employed to achieve production of 1.5 million kilogramme yearly through formation of the farmers groups, and impromptu supervision of the farms.
” It is our expectation that production per coffee tree will increase to more than 10 kilogramme annually based on the continued farmers’ education at the society level,” said Chege. He added that the society was working hand in hand with the appointed marketing agent the Alliance Berries Limited for the interest of production of the premier grades needed by the buyers in the local and international market.
” The society was eying to procure a coffee mill with a 1.5 tonnes per hour milling capacity in efforts to reduce the production cost and maximise returns to the farmers,” he said. To achieve the desired production, the society engaged giant cooperative societies in Kirinyaga and Nyeri counties for benchmarking.
Kahuro sub county cooperative officer Ms Morren Nyawira, said Gatagua society is among the leading coffee producers of the premier grades in Murang’a county, and posted impressive prices at the Nairobi Coffee Exchange (NCE).
In the function, Kenya Coffee Producers Association (KCPA) Chairman Peter Gikonyo asked the management committees to ensure coffee regulations are implemented to the latter. KCPA, he said, was out to ensure the regulation initiated for the benefit of the growers are implemented, pleading with the country governments to license more coffee millers to handle the increased production.
” With the increased production of the commodity the government should license more millers to avoid the challenges being experienced in crop year 2023/2024,” said Gikonyo