Modern Technology Opens Up High Price Markets for Sesame Cooperatives in Ethiopia

Marketing Federation Makes History and Exports High Quality Sesame to Japan

“This machine will enable TMF to reach niche markets like Japan, Israel, US and Europe and develop confidence all along the value chain from member PCs and farmers to financial institutions and buyers”

-Yemane Woldegebriel, Tigray Marketing Federation, General Manager

Although sesame seeds are small, size and color are important. Buyers know the difference in quality, which can be measured by just a few percentage points. The degree to which a seed is cleaned often dictates who will buy it.

Japan is where sesame is most scrutinized. Japanese food requires attention to details and pure, clean sesame is critical. Ethiopian cooperatives rarely sell sesame to Japanese markets, and until now, processing was the sticking point.

That changed in early 2015 when Ethiopian sesame exporter—Tigray Multipurpose Marketing Federation or TMF—inaugurated its latest investment to meet the world sesame market’s highest standards: a cleaning machine. The modern technology, which is equipped with a gravity separator and destoner, raises the degree of purity from 97.5% to an impeccable 99.9%. The new machine can process 8 metric tons of sesame per hour, compared to 4 metric tons with the group’s former machine. In addition, TMF can sell sesame at prices 10-15% higher.

“For now, Japanese buyers are looking at importing 1000 metric tons of sesame from TMF. The market price is good, and the relationship represents a sustainable partnership for future exports,” says Yemane Woldegebriel, TMF General Manager.

TMF is located in Humera, near the Northern Ethiopian border with Sudan and the heart of Ethiopia’s sesame production. The inauguration took place in Humera, but the celebration stretched far and wide across the region of Tigray. The organization, founded in 2010, represents 7 farmer cooperative unions, 38 primary cooperatives and approximately than 30,000 smallholder sesame farmer members.

The new machine is part of AGP-Agribusiness Market Development’s (USAID AGP-AMDe) matching grant activities to increase the competiveness of the sesame value chain, Ethiopia’s second most important cash crop after coffee. USAID AGP-AMDe and TMF each paid half of the $400,000 USD investment for the machinery.

AGP AMDe also supported TMF members through capacity building activities in management and business planning, finance and auditing, quality control and better warehouse management.

The next step for TMF will be adding a color sort hulling machine that will enable the production of tahini and hulled sesame. AGP-AMDe is working with an additional five sesame cooperative unions in Ethiopia to install modern cleaning machinery and improve their business.