NUCAFE
To establish a market-driven system of coffee farmer enterprises and organizations which are empowered to increase their household incomes through enhanced entrepreneurship and innovation.
Who we are
NUCAFE is a hybrid farmer-owned social enterprise founded in 2003 having its business entity, NUCAFE Grading Limited. NUCAFE is the trademark and one of the brands used by NUCAFE Grading Limited in all its operations.
NUCAFE has relentlessly empowered and organized smallholder farmers using the Farmer Ownership Model to assume more roles and functions within the value chain for sustainable livelihoods, consumer satisfaction and societal transformation. This body has registered significant landmarks as a champion in offering exceptionally high quality coffee to high end market off takers and in advancing much resource constrained smallholder farmers into profitable nodes of the coffee.
To establish a market-driven system of coffee farmer enterprises and organizations which are empowered to increase their household incomes through enhanced entrepreneurship and innovation.
Coffee farmers profitably own their coffee along the coffee value chain for sustainable livelihoods, consumer satisfaction and societal transformation.
Source: NUCAFE — Who we are; Our Areas of Operation.
What we do
Ensure good corporate governance and management for the growth of NUCAFE and its member organizations/enterprises.
Through lobby and advocacy, this service contributes to improvement of the business environment for the coffee farming business for increased productivity and profitability.
We facilitate linkage of high-quality coffee from member organizations to high end markets (local and internat- ional) to create increased shared value to farmers.
Enable farmers to produce better quality coffee that meets global standards.
We facilitate farmers’ access to value adding services that include cleaning, drying, destoning, grading, color sorting, export handing, roasting, grinding, blending, branding and packaging.
We create awareness of available financial services for farmers and farmer enterprises. We link farmers to financial institutions and builds capacity in managing and accessing finance.
We provide services to farmers that enable them to comply with international, regional and domestic
coffee market standards for speciality market readiness and penetration. These include: The Farmer Ownership Model(FOM) standard, Fairtrade, Rainforest Alliance (UTZ), Organic Trade.
We improve livelihood of women, men and the youth coffee farmers in the households through increased productivity, quality and profitability of coffee derived from enhancing equity in decision making in the household.
NUCAFE relentlesily works to build resilience of farmers and farmer organizations in climate adaptation and mitigration practices along the entire coffee value chain.
Our pillars
Based on the Farmer Ownership Model that espouses farmer organization to partake of the opportunities along the entire coffee value chain, our activities will be carried out with the farmers’ best interests at the core of the interventions.
One of the key priority areas in the next five years shall be the enhancement of the capacity to generate earned income from the enhanced business activities of the organization
NUCAFE recognizes the importance of working with strategic partners and networking with organizations with similar or complementary mandates. Networking will enable NUCAFE to achieve greater impact than if it acted alone. In the current planning period NUCAFE will strengthen its networks and deepen the relationships by making them more focused and result based.
NUCAFE‘s business models will incorporate social responsibility into its value proposition; as well as attract social investors that can boost the amount and availability of social capital for use in coffee production and processing.
The coffee journey
The Farmer Ownership Model supports coffee farmers to organize themselves and assume as many roles as possible in the coffee value chain.
Organised in associations and cooperatives
Better quality coffee that meets global standards
Cleaning, drying, destoning, grading and sorting
Roasting, grinding, blending, branding and packaging
Linked to high-end local and international markets
High-quality coffee for consumer satisfaction
Farmer Ownership Model
The farmer ownership model is a model that builds the capacities of farmers to remain in charge of their own affairs and be responsible for their own actions but work in partnership with other stakeholders as facilitators. Therefore, it addresses the inefficiencies of the linear coffee value chain which have been impacting negatively on farmers for decades. This model is an intertwined network value chain quite different from the traditional linear value chain which used to focus on only the active players in production, processing and marketing without taking consideration of other stakeholders outside the linear framework such as financial institutions, input supplies, the academia, NGOs.
News & updates
Responding to widespread poverty in the global coffee sector, Fairtrade International is raising its minimum prices for certified arabica and robusta coffee. The new Fairtrade minimum price for washed arabica…
Robusta coffee prices have never been higher in decades than they are today at around Shs7,300 per kilogram of processed coffee. The harvest season for the crop is…
Opportunities
NUCAFE membership is open to organizations and individuals whose primary activities are the planning, marketing and execution of coffee and coffee-processed products in Uganda.
Photo: Kateregga1, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons
