The Ethiopian Commodity Exchange (ECX) has traded about 170,000 tonnes of coffee valued over 4.2 billion birr in 2009, Eleni Z. G.Medhine, CEO of the Exchange told The Reporter .

The Exchange traded the reported amount of coffee in its first year of coffee trading, according to the CEO.

“We traded 4.2 billion birr of coffee in 2009 from December 2, 2008 to December 1st 2009. The beans were traded with no one single payment default or delay or transaction error, “ Dr. Eleni said. “That is astounding over one year of coffee trading which, I think, nobody will dispute.”

“The fact that traders offer up to 3.3 million birr for membership seat at ECX on the first auction we issued very recently indicates that any doubt that the Exchange may or may not succeed was dispelled particularly after we started the coffee trading” the CEO said. “As coffee trading at the Exchange became evidently successful, there are more and more requests to join to the Exchange since the last several months.”

Traders have offered from 200,000 to 3.3 million birr for a membership seat at the Exchange when the enterprise a fortnight ago opened the 150 membership seat bids it issued for the first-time.

The enterprise currently has put in place a mechanism that allows it to trade the small segment of the coffee trade: the specialty coffee, according to the CEO.

“We have now put in place an international system of trading specialty coffee where we provide an international standard grading and certification of specialty coffee. We have taken the internationally recognized Q Grading system and embedded it into the ECX coffee grading system.

ECX trades over 4.2 billion birr coffee in first year
SATURDAY, 09 JANUARY 2010
By Hayal Alemayehu
Reporter