Kenya and Italian governments have for the last three years collaborated to revamp the local coffee value chain through improving cooperative governance and exploring new market opportunities.
Speaking during the ARABIKA Coffee Day 2025 in Nairobi, Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (AICS) representative, Guilio Di Pinto, explained that the ARABIKA project is a collaboration between the Kenyan and Italian governments intended to help Kenya take its rightful place in the market by enhancing the quality of its products and ensuring better access to the markets.
Di Pinto stated that the Three-Million-Euro pilot project funded by AICS has been working through the whole coffee value chain: working with more than 30000 farmers in seven counties through 21 cooperatives. "We closely collaborated with the government of Kenya to design intervention that will help the government revamp and support the coffee value chain, the process led to the launch of the ARABIKA project in 2021," Di Pinto said.
He stated that Italy was recognized as a renowned focal point and the foreign government was approached marking the beginning of a long journey that has been rewarding, Di Pinto noted that through the ARABIKA project they have worked tirelessly with farmers, coffee cuppers and cooperatives as well as establishing coffee cupping labs. "I would call it a big pilot project because the commitment from the Italian government of 3 million Euros was an important commitment," he said.
