06/20/2026
We gathered at Buckman Coffee Factory in SE , many of us old friends and industry veterans and some of us new to the whole cupping thing.
Among other insights from the field, we talked about how pricing manipulation is playing a massive (unspoken) role in how coffee is trading in Ethiopia.
Certain individuals hold outsized power, and use it as bullies. They force cherry prices up—one exporter is paying so much more for cherries that he is putting many competitors out of business, a play which has been attempted by others and backfired so dramatically that it wiped out those who attempted it. Cherry prices starting at 70 birr/kg and ending at 220… his work.
Another, who gets a 35% tax break due to his “smallholder farmer” status (even though he actually exports way too much for that to still apply, doing so through various loopholes and savvy backroom deals) literally sets the FOB price for other smallholder farmers in the area. Once he’s sold his coffees, he allows he other farmers to lower their prices. His father and brothers act as enforcers due to their powerful roles in the area.
These and other dynamics churn below the surface in Ethiopian coffee and affect our global value chain far more than it would seem.
