ORGANIC CHAIN DEVELOPMENT IN ETHIOPIA

Abstract

Introduction A workshop to stimulate awareness and the need for an organic agriculture movement in Ethiopia was held in the Semien Hotel, Addis Ababa, 24-25 May 2007. The collaborating institutions in the organization of the workshop were Agro Eco of the Netherlands, the Dir Foundation of the Netherlands and Ethiopia, and the Safe Environment Association (SEA) and Institute for Sustainable Development (ISD) of Ethiopia. Responsibility for raising the funds and organizing the logistics of the workshop were given to ISD. Although the plan was to invite up to 45 participants, interest in the workshop grew rapidly, particularly from mid-May, so that there were 76 people present on the first day, including 9 journalists, and over 60 on the second day of the workshop – see the List of Participants. Participants included representatives of the major stakeholder groups in the country – government offices, non-governmental and civil society organizations (NGOs and CBOs), agricultural research, certifiers, exporters, and farming cooperatives, – as well as representatives from Grolink of Sweden, Agro Eco of the Netherlands, and the Horn of Africa-Regional Environmental Network and Centre (HoA-REN/C) based in Ethiopia. Both exporters and local growers’ groups, principally youth and women practicing organic urban agriculture, put up displays of their produce. These ranged from high quality vegetables, and even eggs, through samples of honey and wax, aromatic plants, spices, coffee and sesame to field crops. Particularly interesting was a display from the Institute of Biodiversity Conservation of samples of farmers’ varieties (landraces) of Ethiopia’s traditional crops. At the end of the workshop, a task force was identified to establish an Organic Agriculture Movement for Ethiopia.