Yemen Hopes to Attract U.S. Investors in Reborn Coffee Industry

Yemen coffee – image from www.roastmasters.com

Yemen, and its port city Mokha (also written in English as Mocha), once was a coffee cradle, a second birthplace of the cultivated bean behind Ethiopia.

Over the centuries, however, coffee production in the country has suffered to the point near non-existence. Now business leaders of the poverty stricken country — which also has become fertile ground for terrorist networks including Al Qaeda — are hoping to rejuvenate the coffee industry.

On Oct. 18, the U.S. State Department brought a group of Yemeni business leaders to Bloomberg’s New York offices to discuss with editors some of the country’s initiatives to attract investment from the U.S. They told Bloomberg that farmers there are being encouraged to now grow coffee rather than qat, a mild stimulant grown in many former coffee-growing regions.

The full story: Bloomberg Businessweek