Across the continent, Africa is increasing the pace of her paradigm shift from raw coffee bean exports to a more economically beneficial model of value addition and domestic consumption. What exactly this looks like differs from nation to nation, and in Uganda a unique model is underway. It’s called Inspire Africa Coffee, and it’s a modern coffee park.
Dubbed Africa Coffee Renaissance Chapter One, the company has a blueprint for the coffee sector, targeting $5 billion within five years through coffee processing and value addition, product diversification, domestic consumption, export improvement, and coffee tourism. The group has established a multibillion-shilling modern industrial park in the Ntungamo District to produce exciting ready-to-use coffee products.
“The Park concept started in 2017 but took off in 2021,” Perez Akanyijuka, the Program Manager of Inspire Africa Coffee Group and the company behind the Coffee Park, tells Sprudge Media. “We are currently at 60% into the project completion and have scheduled May 2025 for the park to be fully operational. The coffee roasting section of the park is fully installed and we are doing non-commercial production of ground coffee.”
The Group’s CEO projected the park would initially process 10,000 metric tons of coffee earning it $128 million, a dream that has started to materialize.
Coffee Background in Uganda
Coffee in Uganda is purchased from farmers and exported in raw form to developed countries. But for domestic consumption, that very same coffee is processed, packed, and imported back into the country—a strange arrangement for Uganda’s burgeoning coffee drinking market. Based on the exorbitant prices at which this imported coffee is sold, coffee farmers are relegated to downcast spectators in a home game; many settle instead for cheap tea leaves from their local supermarkets and shops.
“The battle for coffee is to stop the hemorrhage [of money] because Africa has been bleeding for a long time,” President Museveni, who has extended support for the park said, during an inspection tour of the park in May. He observed that in Uganda when you export unprocessed coffee you get $2.5 per kilogram, but when exported to countries like Japan that do not even grow coffee, they process it and get $40 per kilogram. He said this shift in the value chain will increase Uganda’s coffee revenue from $1 billion to $4 billion.
Coffee Value Addition and Job Creation
The coffee sector is changing fast in Uganda, and indeed, across Africa, thanks to projects like Inspire Africa Coffee. The project’s overall objective is to increase value for coffee in Uganda, according to Akanyijuka. His goals are ambitious: the above stated goal of moving from $1 to $4 billion a year has even more room to run, with a $5 billion annually projected by 2030.
The park already has employees, including those helping to manage coffee drying and roasting operations. Some 163 employees as of September 2024 are employed by the park, including permanent staffers and technicians. The park produces premium coffee roasted and packed under four different brands—Inspire Africa ground coffee, Haraka instant coffee (sachets and capsules), Era coffee beauty products (hand lotions, body cream, lip bum, shampoo, and more), cold brew coffee (in cans), and coffee drips, with a promise of malt coffee and coffee energy drinks.
Africa Coffee Renaissance Chapter One
Africa Coffee Renaissance Chapter One is built around a strategy to enhance and increase coffee value in Uganda. But it’s a multipart approach, according to Akanyijuka. These include cultivating and encouraging domestic coffee consumption in Uganda, diversifying the varieties of coffee products, establishing a coffee academy, and promoting coffee tourism in the country—something the CEO says will need an additional $122 million.
2.3 million tourists visit the country annually and the park aims to integrate coffee tourism to maximize the gains. Most tourists have limited knowledge about coffee beyond what they get from coffee shops or coffee cafes. Visiting coffee farms can be a rewarding experience for tourists to appreciate the beautiful coffee bushes, mingle with people behind their favorite drink, and sample locally brewed coffee “concoctions” at the coffeeroots (grassroots). Boasting an expansive 92-acre coffee garden at the park’s location, the company hopes to offer recreational facilities on-site to maximize revenue, with Akanyijuka stating, “Every day is a learning process and we’re focused on our objectives for the communities and the country to get value for their coffee.”
The company is mobilizing stakeholders and sharing innovation and knowledge to trigger changes in the sector to ensure what they do in Ntungamo [the Park’s location] can be replicated across the country. As the program manager informs us, the park cannot revolutionize the sector alone. It needs the participation of other stakeholders because they are looking at processing 60,000 metric tons of coffee per year which is far below what the country can produce. The program also aims at raising the living standards of the farmers for a decent life.
“We want to stimulate development by improving prices for our smallholder coffee farmers from the current $2 to $5 per kilogram of raw coffee beans while increasing our company profits and revenue to a minimum of $2.8 billion quarterly,” Akanyijuka tells us.
Overcoming Challenges
The project has suffered negative publicity, especially from coffee cartels in Uganda.
“The top owners of coffee export companies in Uganda are mainly rich foreigners obsessed with exporting coffee in its raw form,” Akanyijuka tells me. “They have tried to tarnish the name of the company, that of the CEO, and the park project. This was especially so when the Uganda government got interested and started investing in our idea.”
The park caught the eye of the Ugandan government in 2022 when it started investing in the hub with an initial sum of $10 million. Since then, the government has continued supporting the venture with more funding and in other ways such as business partnerships and market promotions through the Uganda Coffee Development Authority. Coffee ranks as the second highest foreign exchange earner in Uganda after gold. Although the park is currently 100% private, it has plans to let the government in as a shareholder in the next three years.
Established brands such as Nescafe are also sources of challenges because some people still harbor historically ingrained beliefs of equating a brand’s precedence with superiority. The park aims to prove to the people that the country can produce premium, first-class coffee that can be enjoyed locally and affordably.
The coffee sector in Africa heavily relies on foreign technology and is subject to external pressure and regulations. In Uganda, the industry depends on technologies from Turkey, Italy, China, India, and others. This is not only expensive but also unsustainable. To remedy this, the Park is establishing a coffee academy to impart innovation, knowledge, and skills to fast-track technology and improve coffee production and processing by the locals and coffee farmers.
Coffee farming and processing is an investment-heavy exercise that needs a lot of capital. Getting capital and loans from banks in Uganda (and Africa) is hard and punitive. According to the manager, bank interest rates in Uganda are currently at a high of 16% meaning that they are not only punitive but also negatively affect businesses in terms of ROI.
Looking Ahead
The program manager is all set for the future of coffee in Uganda. The park wants to change the coffee-drinking culture in Uganda in line with the new wave of coffee in Africa from the current domestic consumption of 8% to 30% of the coffee volume produced in the country in the next few years.
“Under our long-term plan, we intend to set up six other hubs across the country. These will be in Eastern Uganda in Mbale, in the West Nile region where there is coffee, in Central Uganda at Muyembe, and Masaka District, among other coffee-producing districts. [Additionally], no coffee beans will be exported unprocessed from Uganda by the next 20 years,” Perez Akanyijuka concludes.
Daniel Muraga is an anthropologist and freelance journalist based in Nairobi.