Once acclaimed as black gold, coffee loses its pricey aroma in Kenya

Farmers sort out coffee berries at Gachatha Coffee Society in Tetu early this year. Many small-holder farmers are abandoning the crop for better-yielding plants. (PHOTO: MOSE SAMMY/ STANDARD)

Coffee has fallen further down the list of the most important cash crops and was worth just Sh12 billion last year.

Artificially low selling prices for coffee beans have disillusioned farmers to ensure an increasingly diminished significance of a crop that was once Kenya’s biggest foreign-exchange earner.