KAYANZA, December 29th (ABP) – Coffee growers of Matongo and Butaganzwa communes in Kayanza province (north) say they are satisfied with the increase per kilogram in the price of cherry coffee, which rose from BIF 800 to 1,280.
Those coffee growers ask the government to continue to promote this industrial crop since, according to them, there are those who have already lost the enthusiasm for practicing coffee growing. This is at a time when the administration in the two communes is calling on coffee growers to constantly maintain the coffee orchards by mulching, fertilizing and spraying, given that coffee provides the foreign exchange that the country needs.
Even though there was this increase in the price of a kilogram of cherry coffee and the measure was well received by the people, the coffee growers of the Matongo and Butaganzwa communes ask the Burundian government to continue to promote this industrial crop so that the people become infatuated with the said crop.
The administration of the aforementioned communes specifies that the people had begun to lose interest in coffee growing, claiming that its price had become derisory compared to other food crops. As a result, the administrative officials of the Matongo and Butaganzwa communes ask the people in general and coffee farmers in particular to attach more importance to that crop because it generates a lot of foreign currency that the country so needs a lot.
Note that all this was mentioned on Wednesday December 27, 2023, when coffee farmers who brought their cherry coffee to the Mpemba washing station in Matongo commune benefited from a bonus of BIF 200 per kilogram of cherry coffee A. This station, which belongs to the cooperative called “Kazoza ni ikawa”, uses only organic manure, which allows the increase in coffee production both in quality and quantity, according to the leader of that cooperative, Mr. Salvator Riragendanywa.