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In April, World Coffee Research (WCR) facilitated a cross-continental knowledge exchange, bringing Ugandan coffee scientists to Colombia for training on advanced propagation and high functioning seed systems. Uganda is Africa’s largest coffee exporter and has set an ambitious goal to increase national production to 20 million bags by 2030. Reaching that target will require high-yielding, resilient plants, stronger nurseries, and reliable systems that can move improved varieties into farmers’ fields at scale.

New investment focuses on creating high-efficiency molecular breeding tools to reduce the decades-long timeline currently required to deliver new coffee varieties to farmers. This research will identify genetic markers for devastating pests and diseases, including coffee leaf rust, coffee berry disease, coffee fruit rot, and coffee berry borer.

Newly released 2025 annual report provides highlights from the past year, updates on major program areas

UNIDO, JDE Peet’s, The J.M. Smucker Co., and Lavazza Foundation commit €850,000 toward a WCR-led effort to strengthen seed system supply chain resilience in Africa’s largest coffee exporter.

A brief profile on the latest addition to our global team