The International Trade Centre (ITC), under the European Union (EU)-funded EU-East African Community (EAC) Market Access Upgrade Programme (MARKUP II), has begun working with the EAC to explore ways to strengthen regional coffee trade.

This has come at an opportune time, when coffee prices have risen and regional production is on the increase as a result of initiatives over the past 5–10 years led by governments, the private sector and NGOs. Given the importance of coffee in providing employment and livelihoods to nearly 2 million families in the EAC, it is a good time to see what measures can be taken both to protect the gains of the past decade and to stimulate further growth.

ITC identified the African Fine Coffees Association (AFCA) and the Inter-African Coffee Organisation (IACO) as key partners in this work. All countries covered by the MARKUP II programme are members of both IACO and AFCA. In addition, the annual African Fine Coffees Conference & Exhibition, in which IACO participates, provides an important platform for discussion of key issues in the coffee sector.

ITC therefore worked with AFCA and IACO to introduce the two key areas of AfCFTA opportunities and derisking the coffee business into the programme for the 2025 Conference and Exhibition held in Dar es Salaam, United Republic of Tanzania. In addition, a Policy Dinner was held to expand on the matters raised in the two sessions and determine a way forward. The results of these sessions presented here are based exclusively on the findings from the African Fine Coffees Conference & Exhibition held in Dar es Salaam in February 2025.