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Speech by B. Byskov for the presentation of the Gourmet Coffee Project at the informal JAG, 

Wednesday 12 April 2000.

Good Morning Ladies and Gentlemen !

Gourmet Coffee ! - Let me first of all give you a definition:

Gourmet Coffee is coffee of a high quality – usually from a single

estate or area.

The combination of quality and often limited availability gives an exclusivity which often commands very high prices

There might be other definitions but this one gives the important elements.

The world market for coffee has been stagnant in the nineties, but - there have been some interesting developments on the consumer side. New trendy coffee houses have opened up in all parts of the world. These outlets all want to serve high quality coffees. And they all want to be unique and sell something special. In these coffee houses you are presented with – not a wine list – but an exquisite list of many coffee varieties from which you make your choice.

Suddenly there was a very strong demand for coffees of : high quality - with a good story about the origin of the coffee.

With this in mind, the International Coffee Organization and ITC, developed together in 1996 the Gourmet Coffee Project. The objective was: To help coffee producing countries to take advantage of this new consumer trend.

The project had the following objectives.

To increase earnings of coffee producing countries,

and

To reduce economic vulnerability through

• improvement of coffee quality, and
• better marketing methods

The main players in this 1.4 million US Dollars project are:

• The Common Fund for Commodities which provided 1 million US Dollars.
• The International Coffee Organization – as supervisory body,
• ITC as executing agency and
• Steering committees in the five countries participating

in the project

Five countries were selected as pilot countries for the project:

- Brazil, Burundi, Ethiopia, Papua New Guinea and Uganda.

When the project is completed in May, all member countries in the International Coffee Organization will get to know the outcome of the project.

In other words: All lessons learned – in the field, in processing, in marketing - will be made available to a wide audience.

This slide shows the very different coffee profiles of the five countries – the quantities speak for themselves.

There are three African countries. Burundi – Ethiopia - Uganda . They are among the least developed countries and coffee amounts to more than 50% of their total export earnings. Brazil participates as it is the largest coffee producing country in the world and Papua New Guinea represents the Asian producers.

The key to success in the gourmet coffee world is: Quality. Quality from field to cup. Therefore, the project was forced to concentrate on two areas:

- Product development - which means not only selection of new potential areas and coffee types, but also quality improvements in the field as well as in processing methods,

and – as a second area:

- Market development - covering various forms of marketing and sales.

Most emphasize was put on the marketing and the sales support – in particular in the USA and Japan.

The project provided many types of support. Let me mention a few:

- cup tasting panels among importers

• a large number of cup tasting events
• colorful and informative brochures including the "good story"

- promotion films

• articles in the press
• samples of coffee for exhibitions

…. just to mention a few

All these activities were carried out in a close cooperation with the National Steering Committees which were set up in each of the five countries.

I wish to mention here that the project received valuable support in the US from the Specialty Coffee Association of America and in Japan from the All Japan Coffee Association.

As mentioned earlier, all lessons learned will be made available to all member countries of the International Coffee Organization in May. But it is obvious that the five participating countries have benefited already from their direct involvement.

We have recently asked each country to tell us what they see as the greatest benefit – or gain – from the Gourmet Coffee Project. Please look at these answers which were given by the countries themselves :

Brazil got a better recognition as a producer of not only a bulk coffee but of gourmet coffees as well. This improved image was to some extent obtained through the recent Internet auction which you will hear more about in a few minutes.

For Burundi, the coffee is now identifiable from field to cup – which is part of the Gourmet Coffee concept. Burundi has also found new sales outlets – in particular in Japan.

Ethiopia is already known for its high quality coffee. In connection with the project the Ethiopians are changing their selection methods. This is done to avoid that some of their best coffees get mixed with ordinary coffee.

Coffee has its origin in Ethiopia. With emphasize on the so called "legend of coffee" the Ethiopian coffee is now better known among consumers.

In Ethiopia we have also noted that the farmers received a significant portion of the premium obtained on the gourmet coffees.

Papua New Guinea has been able to identify some very high qualities from smallholders communities in remote areas. The marketing efforts have been concentrated on Japan and the support given in the form of brochures, cup tasting arrangements, contacts to importers etc. has been the most valuable part of the project for Papua New Guinea

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Mr. Morten Scholer's speech