The emerging digital infrastructure in the country could possibly help the Indian coffee sector to comply with the European Union regulation on deforestation free products (EUDR), a senior official said.  

The India stack, the extremely good public interface in the country for digitalisation, could be one of the possible foundation for demonstrating compliance on EUDR, said Michael Bucki, Delegation of the European Union to India. He was participating in a session at the World Coffee Conference on the challenges in the coffee trade, where experts from across the world raised concerns on issues such as the EUDR and its impact on growers, the price volatility and climate change among others. 

EUDR requires the EU-based companies to ensure that the products they import are deforestation free. Mario Cerutti, Vice-President, European Coffee Federation, said EUDR has become a reality with the EU passing the legislation that will come into effect from January 1, 2025. Green coffee and roasted coffee are covered under the EUDR, while soluble coffee is not in the scope of the regulation, he said. 

The EUDR can be catastrophic for small coffee producers as it could lead to a significant decline in prices if the growers are not prepared as they would struggle to market outside Europe, said Trishul Mandana, Managing Director, Volcafe. T

Mandana called upon the authorities in the producing origins, including the Coffee Board, to help the producers to be prepare for the legislation, which has already been enacted. Europe consumes about 30 per cent of the coffees produced globally and India exports over 50 per cent of its coffees to the region. 

Coffee talks

Enselme Gouthaon of the African and Madagascar Robusta Coffee Agency, suggested establishing a dialogue with trading partners, particularly the EU. He said there was a need to set up ‘Coffee Talks’ with the EU on the lines of the ‘Cocoa Talks’ which have been held for three years for the cocoa sector, a move that would address the critical concerns including deforestation and environmental protection, sanitary and phyto-sanitary issues, child labour and custom regulations among others. 

Ramesh Rajah, President, Coffee Exporters Association of India, said the track and trace regulation has been applied on the grower, the same is not being applied on roasters. The residue limits on use of agrochemicals should be based on the risks, rather than hazards and that there needs to be buffer period for the implementation of regulation, he said. 

Stating that changing regulatory environment in consuming markets was a key factor for producers, Amit Pant of Tata Coffee said the changes in law are more rapid than the capacities built.  There is a need to build capacity before the regulations are changed, he said. 

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