Poor Farmer

Reuters October 9, 2011 Picture: Courtesy of Bloomberg via WSJ   Mumbai   (Oct 10) - Starbucks Corp is finalizing an equity joint venture with India's Tata Coffee Ltd for opening coffee shops in Asia's third-largest   economy, the Times of India reported on Monday. Seattle-based Starbucks had held talks with other potential partners in India including fast food chain operator Jubilant Foodworks before settling down with Tata Coffee, the newspaper said, citing sources with direct knowledge. Tata Coffee's managing director, Hameed Huq, could not be reached by Reuters at his office in Bangalore, and Starbucks did not immediately respond to a mail seeking comment on the report. Starbucks had signed a pact with Tata Coffee, part of the Tata industrial conglomerate, in January to buy coffee from India and explore opening retail stores in the country, the companies had said in a statement. The Times of India said the Starbucks joint venture ...

Fifty per cent of Ethiopia's coffee is grown in the Jimma region. The finest and most  aromatic quality amounting to 10 per cent of the total production is grown around Harrar. Prior to the Italian conquest of Ethiopia the greater part of this coffee was exported to the United States and to the northern nations of Europe. but since the African campaign more than 10,000,000 pounds of Ethiopian coffee have been sold on the Italian market. Italy imports its coffee principally from Brazil, paying for it by an exchange of national products. A smaller quantity also is imported from Arabia. COFFEE TO AID TRADE OF ITALY Painesville Telegraph Apr 2, 1938 ROME - April 2. - A special commission of agricultural experts has presented to Premier Benito Mussolini an exhaustive report on the possibilities of coffee production in the empire. The commission was delegated by Il Duce to study the possibility of increasing the production of coffee in Ethiopia. Italians drink the equ...

By Danial Edyegu, Xinhua  ( email the author ) The East African October 9  2011 A farmer picks her coffee crop. (Photo: Courtesy of The East African) In a surprise twist of market forces, prices of Arabica coffee parchment have risen again in Bugisu region, eastern Uganda, despite earlier predictions from the Uganda Coffee Development Authority that the bumper season would be affected by the landslide tragedies nearly two months ago.  The price increment comes in the wake of the August 29 landslides in Bulambuli district that left scores of villagers dead and around 1,300 acres of coffee plantations destroyed. The UCDA had predicted low prices, saying the landslides had washed off the top soils, leaving behind rocky soils. Each acre of Arabica coffee takes up to 680 coffee trees. This, the UCDA said, indicates that more than 884, 000 coffee trees were destroyed in the tragedy.  Though prices slightly dropped at the beginning of the ha...

Export numbers exceed that of output in 2010-11 crop year M. R. Subramani The Hindu October 9, 2011 CHENNAI, OCT. 9 - A controversy has cropped up over the country's coffee production figures. While the Coffee Board admits there could be a bit of problem with its projections, exporters and growers are divided on the issue. The confusion has also given way to a controversy over how much coffee is actually being consumed domestically. The problem arose after the Coffee Board's export data for the 2010-11 crop year (October-September) were released. According to the Board, exports last season were 3.57 lakh tonnes (lt), a 33 per jump from 2.68 lt the previous year. The important fact here is how have exports hit 3.57 lt when production was estimated at 3.02 lakh tonnes. Even if allowance is given for imports for re-exports (37,500 tonnes) and export of crop from previous years, the figures don't tally if domestic consumption is taken into considerat...