Vietnam is the world’s second largest coffee exporter, with smallholders earning relatively high incomes. This is the result of a steady development of the coffee sector over several decades. This case describes how it came about, and yields valuable lessons for living income practitioners in other contexts.

Decades of strong government-led development in combination with a willingness of farmers to employ coffee production as a path to prosperity developed a strong and globally dominant Vietnamese coffee sector. The focus on high-volume Robusta (not Arabica) instead of quality allowed the country to leverage its beneficial natural conditions for Robusta in the Central Highlands. Finally, reasonable levels of political stability and government effectiveness contributed to relatively high incomes for coffee farming households.

This case study is an extract from the larger report Components for creating living income policy initiatives: Insights from 3 policy case studies.