Diagnosing the Value-Chain Constraints and Opportunities for Smallholder Arabica Coffee in Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia’s Arabica coffee is produced almost entirely by smallholder farmers. Although the local production meets only a small share of national consumption, the sector has expanded substantially in recent years under national development initiatives and strategic investment. This study diagnoses the smallholder value chain in Jazan, Asir and Al Baha through a cross-sectional survey of 347 farms in 14 governorates (May–November 2023). Mean green-bean yield was 0.37 kg per tree (median 0.25), which is within the global smallholder Arabica range, and the top 6.5% of the farms exceeded 1 kg per tree. Water scarcity was the leading production constraint (84.9% of respondents). This prompted a separate, exploratory irrigation survey of 57 Jazan farms (January 2024), which found true drip irrigation to be about 50% more water-productive than basin or stripped-emitter systems, a finding that would need confirmation through controlled trials. Although membership is self-selected and unmeasured confounding cannot be excluded, farmers who belonged to a producer organisation consistently performed better across the value chain. Their yields were higher (0.40 versus 0.23 kg per tree, p = 0.003), and this advantage held after adjustment for farm and farmer characteristics (+78%, 95% CI + 33 to +137). In addition, 24% of members undertook on-farm roasting against 3.9% of non-members. These findings point to wider producer-organisation coverage, more efficient irrigation and improved post-harvest handling as priority areas for intervention and future evaluation.