sisted of giving seminars, something that coffee growers did not really need.

The future of the coffee replanting program, at least in its current form, is unclear. In its _2004/05 Annual Report_ , UCTF noted that (p. 21) “According to UCDA notice of May 2004 ... government will no longer buy coffee seedlings. UCDA has advised the nursery operators that the seedlings should be planted on demand basis.” Given that free distribution of trees was a key element of the program, one may argue that, in ef‐ fect, the replanting program was terminated in May 2004.

# **7. Conclusion**

Responding partly to high prices and partly to efficiency gains from the policy reforms, Uganda’s coffee industry boomed during the mid‐1990s with exports exceeding 4 mil‐ lion 60‐kg bags—the highest level in the country’s history. By all accounts, such growth was a key contributor to the poverty reduction documented in rural areas. When coffee prices started declining in 1997, so did coffee production. However, production kept declining even when prices recovered. Even more worryingly, the ongoing decline has taken place in spite of an aggressive replanting program designed to replace Uganda’s ageing tree population with newer varieties. Such decline, which has been accelerated by the spread of the coffee wilt disease, understandably raised concerns among policy makers and prompted a flurry of reports by public, private, and donor agencies.

Most reports identify declining coffee quality and Uganda’s poor market posi‐ tion as the industry’s key problems. The evidence presented here, however, overwhelm‐ ingly showed that the quality of coffee has not deteriorated. With respect to marketing and regulation, the findings of the present paper largely echo those of the FOODNET (2002, p. 56) report which argued that Uganda’s coffee industry supply chain is com‐ petitive and efficient while there is not much to be done to reduce marketing and proc‐ essing costs. On the other hand, there are no policy, regulatory, or institutional con‐ straints within the marketing chain. As one coffee exporter put it, “Uganda must be do‐ ing something right for all these traders from neighboring countries to want to trade their coffee through our marketing system.”<sup>**7**</sup> Further, UCDA is playing a useful role in terms of regulation, inspection, collecting and disseminating statistics, being one of a few commodity organizations in Sub‐Saharan Africa that publishes an Annual Report with very useful statistics, analysis of current issues, and, most importantly, an audited account of its finances. The one percent fee charged on all exports to support its budget is also not high, especially at current volumes and prices. However, at least two of the UCDA’s activities must be reexamined (or, perhaps, removed from its mandate), namely its involvement in coffee promotion activities and its capacity to run the re‐ planting program.

Strategies to increase specialty coffee have been proposed very often. During the past nine years only 0.21 percent of Ugandan coffee output was marketed as specialty coffee, very low compared to the world average of 6‐8 percent. This should not be sur‐

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