Africa's main coffee producing nations hope to increase their output to 23.5 million 60-kg bags by 2012 from 13.5 million bags currently and redeem the continent's share of the international market.
The head of the Inter-African Coffee Organisation (IACO), Josefa Sacko, said eventually Africa's top producers aim to lift production to 33.5 million bags in the next 10 years.
"Our objective is to identify problems in each country and draw a new plan and set an objective that would enable the 25 African nations to produce annually an aggregate 23.5 million bags within the next five years," Sacko, IACO's secretary general told Reuters in an interview. "This could be achieved if each member state would be able to produce 400,000 bags of coffee annually."
Africa's share of the international coffee market was 30 percent in the 1970s but has dropped to 17 percent over the years undermined by a combination of poor earnings, mismanagement and conflicts. Sacko was speaking at a two-day conference in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa attended by various players in the coffee industry.
According to IACO, 44 million people in rural Africa depend on coffee for survival. Sacko said African countries must increase production of quality coffee and set up coffee industries to produce value-added products.
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