CoCE

CoCE ( Conservation and use of the wild populations of Coffea arabica in the montane rainforests in Ethiopia ) is the name of a research project and stands for the conservation and use of wild populations of Coffee arabica in the montane rainforests of Ethiopia. The overall objective of the project CoCE is the combination of conservation of genetic diversity of wild coffee and the diversity of species and ecosystems within the montane rain forest

The project is funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). By It is run by the Center for Development Research ( ZEF) in Bonn and the Ethiopian Coffee Forest Forum ( ECFF ) in Ethiopia.

Background

The montane rain forests in southeastern Ethiopia, the cradle of the wild Coffea arabica, the archetype of a large part of modern commercially used coffee breeds. Due to the dwindling size of the mountain rain forests by clearing the precious resource of wild Arabica coffee is increasingly threatened.

Ethiopia's land area was covered at the end of the 1960s down to 40 percent by dense forest, whose share has now fallen to 2.7 percent. The former Kingdom of Kaffa in the south west of the country is now a part of the Southern Nations, Nationalities and People 's Region, one of the nine ethnic divisions of Ethiopia. The rapidly developing town of Bonga is the economic center of the Kaffa region. In the Kaffa region only 200,000 hectares of undisturbed African montane rain forest have been preserved. However, these are extremely threatened in their existence, since the pressure on this forest region - due to the growing population, infrastructure projects such as road construction and investor plans - increasing steadily.

List of key partner institutions

• Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN ), Bonn, Germany
• Bureau of Environmental and Ecological -economic Assessment ( BETA), Wageningen, The Netherlands
• Centre de Coopération Internationale pour le Développement en Agricultural Research ( CIRAD ), Montpellier, France
• Centro de Investigação the Ferrugens do Cafeeiro ( CIFC ), Oeiras, Portugal
• Department of Biology Education, University of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
• Department of Biology, University of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
• German Society for Technical Cooperation (GTZ ), Addis Ababa, Ethiopia / Eschborn, Germany
• EcoSecurities, Environmental Finance Solutions, Oxford, United Kingdom
• Ethiopian Coffee Forest Forum ( ECFF ), Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
• Ethiopian Economic Association (EEA ), Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
• Ethiopian Institute for Agricultural Research ( EIAR ), Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
• Ethiopian Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
• EU Coffee Improvement Program ( CIP IV)
• Evolve - Consulting for Sustainable Development, Kirchzarten, Germany
• GEO saves the Rainforest eV, Hamburg, Germany
• Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (IBC ), Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
• Institute of Crop Science and Resource Conservation ( INRES ), University of Bonn, Germany
• Institute for Plant Nutrition, University of Bonn, Germany
• International Coffee Genome Network ( ICGN ), Montpellier, France
• Jima Agricultural Research Center, Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research ( EIAR, former EARO ), Jimma, Ethiopia
• Kraft Foods, Bremen, Germany
• Faculty of Agriculture and Horticulture - Division of Resource Economics, Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany
• Learning processes for sustainable development, Wuppertal, Germany
• National Herbarium of Ethiopia, Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia
• Nees Institute for Biodiversity of Plants, University of Bonn, Germany
• Regional Coffee Producer Associations, Ethiopia
• Science Development, Wuppertal, Germany