The document summarizes the goals and challenges of the Association of Women in Coffee Industry in Kenya. It discusses the origins of the organization in 2020 with the goal of bringing more women into the coffee industry value chain. It outlines challenges women face, including lack of land ownership, access to credit and resources, and underrepresentation in leadership. Recommendations include establishing a coffee fund for women and youth, creating traceability programs, implementing training and policies focused on climate change mitigation, and promoting women's empowerment through access to resources and decision making roles.

1. G25 AFRICA SUMMIT(ACS)
25TH
to 27th
May 2022 Safari Park Hotel Nairobi Kenya.
Sustainable Development and Economic Growth in the African Coffee Sector
Panel 7 ‘ Youth &Women in Coffee’
WHO WE ARE
The Association of Women in Coffee Industry has its origins in 2020 AFCA meeting in Mombasa where some of the
founder members met and took up the challenge to set up an Association of Women in Coffee that would act as a focal
point for the women in the entire coffee value chain. The Association of Women in Coffee Industry is a membership
organization in Kenya registered in 2020 whose main aim is to take action to bring women into full participation in the
mainstream of the coffee value chain. Members of the association are subscribers to the association’s constitution and
include any woman in the coffee value chain over the age of eighteen years. The Association of Women in Coffee
Industry is recognized as a chapter in formation to represent Kenya at the Global IWCA (International Alliance of
Women in Coffee).
Our strategic objectives are:
a) Information and Knowledge dissemination
b) Market Access and Logistics
c) Connections and Networks
d) Access to Finance
e) Advocacy
f) Digitization of the coffee value chain
g) Best Practice sharing and social responsibility
CHALLENGES WOMEN FACE IN THE COFFEE INDUSTRY
1. Huge Gap in accessing resources
a) Access to Credit -Limited financial resources available to women. When available it comes with a high cost
and restrictive conditions for borrowing e.g. land ownership documents to secure loans.
b) Land – majority of the land is owned by men in the coffee growing zones
2. Skewed Distribution of Roles
a) Delegation to manual labor providers: About 70% of the production labor in the coffee industry is provided by
Women. However the women have limited or no say at all over revenues generated from coffee sales.
b) Women are not fully represented in the management committees in the coffee cooperatives despite of the two
thirds gender rule which has not been fully implemented. We need more women at the decision-making table
3. Reduced/Constrained Production Capacity
a) Impact of climate change
b) Education and lack of well-coordinated extension services.
c) Expensive inputs and access to quality inputs that is eroding farmers’ profitability.
OUR RECOMMENDATIONS ON SUSTAIANABLE DEVELOPMENT AND ECONOMIC GROWTH IN
THE AFRICAN COFFEE SECTOR.
1. Establish a coffee fund specifically targeted at women and youth in Africa.
2. Create/establish Traceability from cup to farm for sustainable production and consumption specifically
targeting coffee produced by women and youth for ease of access by buyers.
3. Governments to provide extension officers and trainings to be structured considering women needs and
specifically focusing on climate change mitigation in the coffee industry
4. Implementing the Sustainable Consumption and Production program. Women and youth to lead the campaign
for domestic consumption supported by government
5. Create platforms for best practice sharing among women and youth in coffee in Africa
6. Affirmative action for youth and women in the leadership across the coffee value chain at the decision tables.

2. 7. Governments to set up bodies whose mandate is to increase production and have clear strategies, introduce
scales and coordination.
8. Capacity building for farmers to understand better how the market dynamics work to ensure that they make
data driven and knowledge driven decisions
9. Come up with Climate mitigation policies for the coffee industry to cushion farmers from the emerging
climate issues.
COFFEE THE PATH TO ‘The Africa we want’
The importance of coffee sub sector in Africa cannot be over emphasized. It is an important exchange earner,
source of food security, source of employment directly and indirectly, a main player in poverty eradication in
Africa and globally provides livelihoods to an estimated 25Million rural households. As a result, the sub-sector is
key to the central agricultural role in contributing and realizing of African Union ‘the Africa we want’ vision 2063
which is Africa’s blueprint and master plan for transforming Africa into the global powerhouse of the future,
coffee is already a global south and a global north crop and it therefore provides a platform to swing African to the
global arena. Focusing on the sustainable development of coffee adds to the AU’s continent’s strategic framework
that aims to deliver on its goal for inclusive and sustainable development and enhancing the affirmative action on
youth and women is a concrete manifestation of the drive for unity, self-determination, freedom, progress and
collective prosperity.
It is our humble submission the resolution
• GENDER SENSITIVE AND EVIDENCE BASED PUBLIC POLICIES, PROGRAMMES AND
SERVICES AS WELL AS SUSTAINABLE SUPPLY CHAIN POLICIES THAT WILL REACH,
BENEFIT AND EMPOWER WOMEN AND YOUTH IN THE COFFEE VALUE CHAIN.
• E-COMMERCE PLATFORM THAT HAVE TRACEABILITY SYSTEMS FOR COFFEES GROWN
BY WOMEN AND YOUTH AND HAVE SOME PREMIUMS TO SUCH COFFEES.
• AFRICA COUNTRIES ACTIVELY PROMOTE WOMEN’S EMPOWERMENT IN THE COFFEE
SECTOR THROUGH ACCESS TO RESOURCES BE IT CREDIT (Have a women and youth fund
specific to Coffee value chain), EXTENSION/ADVISORY SERVICES AND TRAININGS (mostly men
access the training yet the women are the labourers).
Signed
Josephine Ndigwe
Chairperson
Dr. Rosebella Langat
Secretary