A Mathematical formulation of the transportation of Arabica coffee within Tanzania

Peasants grow coffee mainly for export to the metropolitan countries (Western Europe and the United States of America). Together with coffee transport Workers and the coffee processing Workers, the Peasants contributed 22% (495,300,000 shillings) of the 1973 total foreign exchange earnings for Tanzania. This amount of money, collected by the Tanganyika Coffee Board, does not represent the full value of the coffee crop. The owners of the coffee industries in the metropole appropriate the major portion of it. What the producers of coffee, the Peasants, get from the Tanganyika Coffee Board is what remains after the intermediate costs of marketing, storage, transport, coffee tax, Bank interest etc. are deducted from the total revenue. The coffee transport Workers and the coffee processing Workers get, in most cases, a minimal wage from the transporters and factory owners. The objective of my research was to analyze the above deductions with special emphasis on the coffee transportation system and the problems connected with it. I will investigate the effect of transport timing on: (a) Transport costs (b) Storage costs in the regions and in the Tanganyika Coffee Curing Factory (Moshi); (c) Bank Interest costs, and (d) Coffee quality. The findings show that, with regard to Ruvuma and Mbeya regions, quick transport mean less Bank Interest and less Quality deterioration, but more storage costs. The Transportation costs remain the same if the mode of transport remains the same.