UGANDA – The Uganda Coffee Development Authority has reappointed Dr. Emmanuel Iyamulemye as its Managing Director, to ensure the gains made by the authority and the coffee sector over the years are sustained.

Under the leadership of Dr. Iyamulemye (2016 to 2021), the coffee sector attained notable achievements at both the national and global levels. 

Dr. Charles Mugoya, the Chairman of the UCDA Board applauded Dr. Iyamulemye for his leadership and noted that the Board’s tenure starts at a time when Uganda’s coffee is making a great comeback.

Over the past year, Uganda has attained numerous milestones and seen the sector thrive despite the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2020, the East African nation was ranked 3rd country with the best coffee globally by independent specialists who cupped blind samples from different origins.

In July of the same year, Uganda’s monthly coffee exports surpassed 500,000 60-kg bags for the first time. The volumes of coffee exports have kept rising and peaked at 700,250 bags worth US$ 70 million in July 2021.

This year, Uganda overtook India as a leading supplier of coffee to Italy and behind only Brazil.

For a long time, Uganda’s coffee production had stagnated at 3.5 million bags but after interventions initiated by the Authority and other stakeholders such as Operation Wealth Creation, National Coffee Research Institute, cultural and religious institutions, coffee production and exports have risen.

The UCDA October report shows that coffee exports for 12 months (November 2020 – October 2021) totalled 6.55 million bags worth US$ 657.23 million compared to 5.41 million bags worth US$ 513.79 million the previous year. This represents an increase of 21% and 28% in both quantity and value respectively.

“I take this opportunity to congratulate Dr. Emmanuel Iyamulemye on his reappointment as the Managing Director of Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA).

“We have no doubt that he will continue to serve the sub-sector with the same passion he did over the last five years,” noted Hon. Kyakulaga. Hon. Frank Tumwebaze, the Minister of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries (MAAIF)

Emmanuel is an agricultural scientist (Ph.D., MBA), with over 15 years of experience in agriculture-related programme design and delivery.

His core competencies are in strategic planning, and programme management, reviews, and evaluations; his technical background and competencies are agriculture, agribusiness, rural development, crop protection, import, and export risk analysis, sanitary and phytosanitary issues.

Before joining UCDA, he was the National Programme Coordinator for the EU-funded Northern Uganda Agriculture Livelihoods Recovery Programme (ALREP) and the Karamoja Livelihoods Programme (KALIP), in the Office of the Prime Minister, Uganda. He was also Programme Manager, FAO – October 2008 to July 2010.

He holds a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Agricultural Sciences from Wageningen University, and a Master’s degree, Crop Science from the same University and a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from Uganda Martyrs University.

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