A delegation from the Ethiopian Embassy in Beijing participated in the 2^nd China International Specialty Coffee Expo which took place last week from Tuesday to Sunday (March 12-17) in Pu’er City, considered the “Coffee Capital” of China. The Expo was co-hosted by the Industry Promotion Center of the Ministry of Commerce and Yunnan Province International Coffee Exchange (YICE). The aim was to foster commercial partnerships among stakeholders of the global coffee industry and the Expo brought together more than 1,000 participants from different corners of the world, including coffee industry experts, producers, roasters, café owners, baristas, importers, exporters, industry associations, and government officials.

Ethiopia’s participation offered the Chinese coffee community the opportunity to explore its coffee exports and its value-adding processing. The delegation from the embassy shared the experience of Ethiopia’s organic, high quality varieties of coffee. Ethiopia, as the ancestral home of the highly desirable Arabica varieties of coffee, is well-positioned to penetrate the specialty coffee market in China. The Expo focused on the rapidly growing coffee market in China where there has been a recent tectonic shift towards a more upscale coffee drinking culture. China is rapidly becoming a member of the league of the largest coffee-consuming countries.

China presented a new Trade Facilitation Initiative under the Forum on China Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) last year. This is intended to expand the spectrum of imports from Africa, and among Ethiopia’s value-added and specialty coffee offers promising potential for export growth. In its presentation at the Expo, the Embassy delegation underlined the long-term efforts of the Government of Ethiopia to improve traceability of coffee beans and transparency for the return to coffee growers. These offer a meaningful contribution for the transformation of the global specialty coffee market.

On the side-lines of the Expo, the Embassy delegation also met with the municipal leadership of the People’s Government of Pu’re City and officials of the Yunnan International Coffee Exchange. They held useful discussions on ways to cooperate further in developing the specialty coffee market and Ethiopia’s coffee exports.