Poor Farmer

By Candice Choi AP News via Businessweek October 25, 2012 NEW YORK (AP) — McDonald's will start selling bags of ground coffee at its restaurants in Canada next month, a move that could spread to other regions around the world if successful. The world's biggest hamburger chain says the ground coffee will be available in the majority of its 1,400 stores by Nov. 8. The packages will weigh about 340 grams (about 12 ounces) and cost about 7 Canadian dollars ($7.04). A representative at the company's headquarters in Oak Brook, Ill., was not immediately available to say whether there were any plans to sell ground coffee in the U.S. But the company filed a trademark for "McCafe" ground and whole bean coffee here last month. John Betts, president of McDonald's Canada, also noted in an interview that McDonald's has a history of taking hit products from specific regions and expanding them globally. The company's McCafe specialty coffees we...

by   James Cordier & Michael Gross   of   Liberty Trading Group Inside Futures October 25, 2012 While many commodities are prone to sharp fluctuations in demand, coffee demand has consistently increased for decades.  That demand paradigm might have a steep increase in the coming years as China, India and other emerging countries are introduced to the marketing power of the West. Rising Global Demand Global demand for coffee is expected to grow by an annual rate of 2-3 percent for the next decade.  Meanwhile, coffee production has had a difficult time keeping up with demand in recent years.  The International Coffee Organization (ICO) recently announced that they will launch a marketing campaign to promote coffee in emerging countries.  This should help increase demand and lay the groundwork for acquiring new and loyal coffee drinkers into the future. Demand for coffee is fairly inelastic in the major consuming countries....