The Ethiopia Commodities Exchanges signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the government of the United States. The US government signed the agreement through the agency of the Unites States Agency for International Development.

The agreement is intended to allow collaboration towards enhancing the quality, marketing and traceability of Ethiopian coffee.

The agreement facilitates a partnership between the Agricultural Growth Program-Agricultural Market Development Project of the USAID with the exchange to enable sellers and buyers to track the origin of coffee through electronic coding and marking. The collaborative efforts will also include certifying laboratories and quality graders as well as enhancing the efficiency of the ECX warehouse system and increasing the number of farmer’s cooperatives. The agreement for joint initiative is expected to ensure the quality and market efficiency of the Ethiopian coffee trading system.

The agreement is in line with the commitment of the exchange of the benefit to ensure that small hold farmers are direct beneficiaries of the commodities system explained Anteneh Assefa, Chief Executive of the exchange.

The US is happy to renew its cooperation with the ECX said Dennis Weller, Mission Director for USAID in Ethiopia.

It is to be remembered that the US was one of the original donors who supported the establishment of the Ethiopian exchange back in 2008. The USAID provided the funds for four technical advisors as well as supporting the Direct Specialty Trade which linked small hold producers with international buyers, helped furnish warehouse equipment and establish the Warehouse Receipt System.

Source: The Reporter