30 years of quality regulating of Uganda coffee exports

The Quality Assurance Directorate is almost as old as the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA), having started as a department a year after UCDA was established.

Doreen Rweihangwe - The Acting Quality and Regulatory Services Director

Coffee Consumption

Over the years, UCDA has registered a number of successes such as sensitizing the medical professional about the advantages of coffee consumption.

At the time, there were only five people manning the department headed by Henry Ngabirano, who is now retired, and I was a young graduate with no experience. I gained a lot of experience from this team because it had migrated with too much knowledge from the Coffee Marketing Board, after it closed.In those days, coffee was transported by rail out of the country, in food grade containers, and it was against the law to transport it using any other means to the ports of Mombasa and Dar-es-salaam, for export. In our early days, the quality assurance department was sitting at Ambar House, before we shifted to the coffee house on Jinja Road, when it became property of UCDA, and set up our first lab.

At the time, everything was manual and hectic, but we still did a good job, because our exports at the time stood at about 3 million 60kg bags per annum. Remember, this was a time when we did not have systems, because they were developed later as and when they became necessary, until computers came and we migrated all of our records and procedures to the digital systems.

By the 2000s, computers were fully in place and we had learned how to use them, although still, there were no mobile phones to ease communication.

The lab continued at Jinja Road until 2000 when we shifted to Lugogo, because the head office had become too congested, creating an obvious need to shift the lab to an offsite location. In 2005, the International Specialty Movement came to Uganda and trained us in advanced cupping, after which we were registered as Arabica cuppers by the Coffee Quality Institute (CQI) of the USA.

We in turn trained our colleagues to create sustainability, but also trained other coffee sub sector stakeholders to equip them with knowledge of the international community’s expectations, during export. After the accreditation, we realised we had a problem, because Uganda produces 80% Robusta and 20% Arabica yet the standards we had been trained in and received accreditation were for Arabica.

We quickly started pressing the CQI to develop standards for Robusta, but quickly realised these did not exist. So later they asked us to help in developing the standards using our expertise, and this is how the center of excellence was born.

Since the day we were established, our mandate has always been centered around ensuring that the coffee that we export meets international standards.

Under the directorate, we have three departments that help us implement this mandate, the first of which is the Quality Assurance Department.

Under this department, we conduct training for stakeholders, such as farmers, farmer organisations, exporters and processors along the value chain, on standards in the sub sector.

These standards include the green bean standard which is an EAC standard, which we use to do physical and sensory evaluation. We also do inspection of all exports and supervise loading of all exports in addition to issuing export documents to all coffees that are exported.

At inspection, we strive to see that all coffee for export goes in food grade containers, and our supervisors who sit onsite, in all the five zones, ensure that this is done.

Our zones are spread out in Namugongo, Ntinda, Namanve, Kawempe, Industrial Area and Bweyogerere, because much of the processes for export happen in and around Kampala.

At Lugogo, we have a lab which we basically use to test standards through physical and sensory evaluation of the coffee and has 5 attendants at all times. The lab is fully equipped with roasting and cupping equipment and computers for capturing the data, in addition to the intermediate quality control training conducted for the quality assurance officers for the different grading factories.

We also have collaboration with the coffee institute, USA which uses our lab as an in-country lab for doing international certification for graders.

Normally, the graders are trained in Arabica or Robusta grading and after exams they qualify for a three years certificate.

In this lab, we also do cup evaluation from the samples brought from the coffee research institute in Kituuza, in addition to samples from individual farmers or farmer groups.

It should also be noted that every year, we hold a competition dubbed the best of pearl, which identifies the best coffee of the year, and its producers.

During the competition, we identify the specialty coffee and pay for their advert on the CQI website, for viewing by international buyers. The coffees are also used for promotions on each major coffee event across the world, and right now they are in Dubai for the Dubai expo.

We also issue electronic export documents including the quality certificate which doubles as a transport permit, to enable the coffee to make the voyage up to the port, in Mombasa or Dar-es-salaam, or the airport.

The second department under our directorate is the coffee sustainability and specialty, which primarily looks at sustainable coffees, because under the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), agriculture has to be sustainable to feed the future generations.

Presently, we have projects that are funded by the European Union, to support farmers who wish to follow sustainable initiatives such as the Rainforest Alliance, Organic Fairtrade, and any other. We normally get a third party to train them and then support them with audit and certification fees.

The third one is the Generic and Value Addition Department, whose main work is to ensure that coffee is promoted in Uganda, and that domestic consumption grows.

The department is also charged with

Doreen Rweihangwe interacts with UGACOF staff at their coffee washing station in Kasese.

UCDA Q & R Graders are responsible for cupping and grading all Ugandan coffee before being exported.

ensuring that Ugandan coffee is visible, and sought after by international buyers. In promoting domestic consumption, the department has always hired a medical expert to train our doctors not to miss -advise patients to avoid coffee.

We also have a coffee and youth program, since the majority of Ugandans are youths, who can explore and adopt the beverage.

We also have programs in schools where we train the youths in making coffee, in addition to the university coffee clubs where we encourage these people to look at coffee as a career. Presently, we are in eight universities across the country.

We also train them to be coffee Baristas, and if they are interested, we encourage them to take part in the inter university coffee competitions. The champions progress to the national Baristas championships where we bring in a judge from the international coffee events.

The best out of that championship is sponsored to go for the Africa barista championships and after that they are taken to the world coffee event to compete in the global Barista championships.

With this, some have made careers out of coffee, while others have established barista schools and connect their graduates to overseas employers. Lastly, we also work with women in coffee, which I represent, as their President.

Over the years, we have registered a number of successes such as sensitizing the medical professional about the advantages of coffee consumption. Initially, we had to fly in an expert from Israel, but now we have doctors on call who we go with to help sensitize on coffee consumption.

The other is the opening up of new markets, as we continue to observe standards. For ages, our coffee has been consumed in Europe and Sudan, but of late, new markets have cropped up. When the Sudan market was crippled by internal disorganisation, we recently saw another market open up in Algeria, and Russia is also interested in buying direct, which is a big achievement. We have also seen the Chinese market open up, which is one of the best things to happen to our coffee.

Coffee act

As a directorate we have noted with concern the misconception that enactment of the coffee law will gradually lead to reduction in the volumes produced and exported.

We should remember that when the coffee Act was coming up, there was a lot of stakeholder engagement and discussions. These engagements enriched the law, making it rich with an unbending mandate to regulate the sector for growth.

The act has given us the leeway to regulate right from nursery and this is how we shall maintain the quality of the coffee.

With the law, the planting material must now be traceable, approved by coffee research because now we have now established ecological zones.

To further enrich the law and make it functional, we are coming up with eh regulations, where stakeholders will be widely consulted again.

Currently, the regulations are in draft form, and soon will be brought before the stakeholders for their rich input and discussion.

The way forward now is for us to help and guide stakeholders to move from the export of green coffee to value added coffee, and already a few have started exporting value added coffee. The country is also in the process of establishing a soluble plant, and feasibility studies have been done.

Finally, we are also thinking of expanding our lab, because the place is small, and the government has given us money in the 2023 budget to expand the lad, since the crop is getting bigger.