NEW YORK, December 23, 2024: The EU Deforestation Regulation [ EUDR ] has put commodity producing countries under pressure, with many working hard to find ways to comply. UNDP is encouraging governments in Africa to combine immediate EUDR compliance with long-term transformation of their agricultural sector.
The new regulation requires companies selling products, including coffee, on European markets to show that these products have not been grown on land deforested after 2020, are produced in accordance with local regulations, and must be traceable back to the farm. The fear is that risk-averse international companies will concentrate purchases in production countries best organized to meet the regulation, leaving more vulnerable African producing countries out in the cold.
Proving that coffee has been produced without deforestation in a continent of smallholder farmers is a challenge. Informal, porous supply chains make traceability difficult, and it is unclear how many farmers know of or stick to local regulations. However, maintaining access to the European market is vital – in some producing countries, a quarter of the population depends on coffee for their livelihood.
EUDR preparedness can jump-start some of the necessary change processes, feeding into structural changes that will help strengthen the coffee sector’s organization and governance, build production and exports of more profitable specialty coffee, and put the focus on increasing production on existing land, thereby avoiding deforestation and increasing profits.
With the EU DR implementation deadline ahead, the challenges for the coffee sector in several African countries are immense. UNDP supports governments and all key players in Ethiopia and Rwanda to help prepare for EUDR compliance while also addressing long-term strategic challenges in their coffee sectors. UNDP combines support for specific, technical solutions, such as farmer support systems and traceability with a broader effort to align stakeholder action guided by a shared vision for change.
In Ethiopia, coffee represents about one third of the country’s exports, it is the main source of foreign exchange, and the EU is the largest market with around 30 percent sent to the bloc. UNDP supports the coffee industry in transforming the sector to meet the challenges of the future, setting up a multistakeholder working group focused on supporting the livelihoods of Rwandan coffee farmers.
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