1. JoAnn Jaffe, University of Regina
Amy Kaler, University of Alberta
Improving Nutrition in Ethiopia through
Plant Breeding and Soil Management
IDRC Project 106927-001/2

2. 1. From chickpeas to coffee
2. Theoretical framing: bargaining and moral economies
3. The sites
4. The methods
5. The coffee ceremony
6. Findings: Coffee ceremonies and
1. Household reputation
2. Labour mobilization
3. “Complex gender”
7. Conclusion: coffee ceremonies and social change

4. • Relations within and between households are
• Contested
• Emergent
• Unstable
• Men, women, rich, poor, workers, landowners ….

5. “Bargaining”
• People offer labour, time,
social status in exchange
for present or future
benefits
“Economy of affection”
• Collective understanding
of who owes what to
whom
• Reciprocity
• Patronage
• Mutual assistance
• Not only about money

6. • 2 x (n=20) households in southern Ethiopia
• Increasing need for cash
• Rising food prices
• Paying for labour and land access
• Survival depends on positive social relations
• Loans, food, animals, “hunger season”, credit, grazing
space, seeds, plants, firewood …

7. • C1: Highly differentiated
• C2: Less differentiation
% Households exercising effective control over arable
land

8. • 40 household interviews
• Purposive stratified sample
• 8 focus groups analyzing scenarios
• 2 Photovoice sessions

10. • 90% of households hold at least one CC per day
• Modal number of CCs is 2
• Mean number of guests: 10.4 (ranging from 5 to 20)
• C1: 8.9
• C2:12.0

11. It is a must to make [coffee] it is a duty, even if it means stopping other
jobs. Coffee must be given priority. Two coffee ceremonies are common
for our household. … For the third, if guests come, I’ll help her with the
fire and washing the cups, so she can prepare coffee with me.
We can’t decrease the coffee ceremony … Neighbours will increase the
amount of gossip, the neighbours will think badly of us, and they may
not do coffee with us [invite us to their coffee ceremonies]. (Rich and
medium men, C2).

12. W1: Based on our economy, if we have the coffee
ceremony three times a day the crops will run out. It [the
ceremony] takes much time without working in the field.
[But] if there is no more [ceremonies], the neighbours
talk, they say “she has no crops in the house, she is poor”.
W2: I have the coffee ceremony three times a day. If I stop
doing it, neighbours think I am poor.
W3: If I have no more coffee ceremony, neighbours think
“she has no crops for her coffee ceremony”. But if I prepare
nice coffee, people say “you are skilled, like baalamuya [a
gracious woman]. If I don’t prepare nice coffee, I’m not a
skilled woman. (Wives of male heads of households, C2)

13. • CCs appear to be connected to collective labour groups
• The larger and more frequent the ceremonies, the more
likely the household is to take part
27
79
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
Family-only ceremonies (n=11) Neighbours and kin coffee ceremonies
(n=29)
Percentage participating in collective
work groups

14. • Not just male appropriate of female time and labour
• Dado: Women’s ceremonies
• Baalmuya: Display of gendered competence and skill
• Women’s resistance to reducing ceremonies
W1: My husband tells me that dado is killing time
W2: There’s more time [for other work] now that we’ve
stopped doing dado, but still no advantage for us. (Wives of
household heads, C1)

15. • What’s this got to do with food security?
• Beyond nutrition: building social relations that create food
• Food is social currency as well as “body fuel”
• The future?
• Reductions of ceremonies in C1
• Economy of affection losing ground to mobilization through
money?