The International Financial Corporation (IFC), a part of the World Bank, has disbursed loans worth US$20 million to a local coffee company, Indo Cafco for the setting up a number of farmer training centers in North Sumatra.
Indo Cafco is a local unit of Sweden’s trading company ECOM Agroindustrial Corporation and is the supplier to Starbucks and Nespresso.
The centers are aimed at helping the farmers acquire necessary information on how to produce sustainable coffee products, which will have more added-value and attract premium prices.
The centers will target 4,500 farmer households working for Indo Cafco in the next four years and an additional 30,000 farmers working outside the company network.
Indonesia is the fourth biggest coffee producer in the world and the second biggest in Asia after Vietnam.
The program is part of a $55 million loan agreement between IFC and ECOM being implemented in six countries – Indonesia, Vietnam, Papua New Guinea, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda.
