Blog
Ethiopia’s electronic market place
6th June 2010
Coffee is a lifeline for twelve million farmers in Ethopia who are vulnerable to volatile world prices and the monopsony power of the major coffee roasting businesses. But this heart-warming report from Jonathan Dimbleby finds that a new electronic trading system is providing a superb market place for the setting of prices - connected instantaneously to the world commodities market.
Prices agreed on the Ethiopian trading floor are transmitted round the world and the farmer is guaranteed payment within 24 hours. Since the exchange was launched over $400m has been traded without a single dollar of default. Farmers are getting the price that is agreed on the open-outcry market platform. Technology as a support to the problems of real people - outstanding.
Geoff Riley
Geoff Riley FRSA has been teaching Economics for over thirty years. He has over twenty years experience as Head of Economics at leading schools. He writes extensively and is a contributor and presenter on CPD conferences in the UK and overseas.