Economic Analysis of Farmers’ Preferences for Coffee Variety Traits — Lessons for on-Farm Conservation and Technology Adoption in Ethiopia

On top of its role in the national economy, Ethiopia's coffee diversity is important not only nationally but also in international research and conservation centers. Despite a tremendous attention to salvage its diversity loss through on-farm conservation, there is no attempt to link on-farm conservation, variety adoption, farmers' preferences for variety traits. This paper aims to study coffee farmers' preferences for variety traits and their implications using a multinomial logit model derived from Lancaster's characteristic model. The model is estimated using the data collected from 266 coffee growing farmers in South Western Ethiopia. The results have shown the factors inducing farmers' preference for certain variety traits. Based on the empirical results, the paper derives policy implications in the areas of on-farm conservation, improved variety adoption, and coffee breeding priority setting.