Poor Farmer

Business Standard November 10, 2011 Global coffee prices are likely to remain at comfortable level during the year 2011-12 with Brazil, the major producing country, going to have a off-year, a top commerce ministry official said. “The production of coffee in Brazil is estimated at 47.2 million bags. As such, it is estimated that during 2010-11 there was a surplus of around 5 million bags, which is expected to refill the inventories in importing countries,” Vijaylaxmi Joshi, additional secretary, ministry of commerce said. Addressing the 53rd annual coffee conference of Karnataka Planters Association and United Planters Association of South India (KPA-Upasi), here on Wednesday, she said the main reason for buoyant prices is attributed to overall tight supply position for the past three years decided by more or less stagnant production and increasing consumption. For the past three years in a row, the global supply situation remained tight triggering the price boom whic...

Business Standard November 10, 2011 The Coffee Board and the ministry of commerce were planning to introduce several new schemes in the 12th Five-Year Plan, beginning April 2012, to encourage growers to increase the production of coffee and strengthen the plantation sector, a top Coffee Board official said. “We are fine-tuning draft proposals of the 12th Plan for the coffee plantation sector. The proposals will be finalised within a month. Our existing schemes serve the purpose quite well. But we think some modifications may be required in some of those,” Board chairman Jawaid Akhtar told Business Standard on the sidelines of the 53rd annual coffee conference of the Karnataka Planters Association. He said the Board was planning to come out with a database of coffee plantations in the country to find how much area was under the commodity, which estate was growing how much and the type of coffee grown in each estate. The database would be created with the satellite map da...

By Karen Seidman, Gazette Universities Reporter The Gazette November 9, 2011 U de M study, showed that boiling and frying tuna, shark and  mackerel reduced exposure to mercury by about 40 to 60 per cent,  while coffee and tea ingested at the same time as raw fish reduced exposure  by about 50 to 60 per cent. The two combined pretty much eliminated  exposure to mercury. Photograph by:   Max Rossi, Reuters MONTREAL - Forget saki – a groundbreaking new study from the Université de Montréal shows that sushi-lovers should be eating their raw fish with coffee or tea to reduce their exposure to mercury. The study, published last week in the journal Environmental Research, also shows that boiling or frying fish significantly reduces exposure to mercury. And having cooked fish with a cup of coffee or tea – 250 millilitres – reduces the exposure to mercury to almost nothing, according to the results of the study, which shocked even the re...