Poor Farmer

By Heather Walsh Bloomberg July 09, 2010 Exports will drop below last year’s estimated 95.5 million bags and slide from 2008’s 97.7 million bags, ICO Executive Director Nestor Osorio said in an interview yesterday. He didn’t specify the amount or percentage decline expected this year. “There is less coffee available,” Osorio said by telephone from London. “That’s also reflected in the price.” Coffee prices have increased 19 percent this year in New York amid a shortfall that has prompted investment funds to bet on gains, he said. Production in Colombia, the second-largest producer of mild-tasting arabica beans, dropped to a 33-year low in 2009. Colombia may produce less than 9 million bags in the year that began Oct. 1, Osorio said. In the first six months of the year, the crop unexpectedly slid to 4.04 million bags from 4.24 million bags a year earlier, Colombia’s National Federation of Coffee Growers said yesterday. In February, the group forecast output for the period...

Quantity of coffee exports decreased by December 2009 to 2,935 metric tonnes from a high of 7,252.1 metric tonnes earlier in May of the same year. (Photo: Joseph Kanyi/ Courtesy of Business Daily) By James Waithaka Business Daily June 11 2010 A plan to boost quality control in coffee production promises to strengthen the competitiveness of the crop and increase farmers’ earnings. The European Union and Kenya-based DCDM are jointly funding a certification project aimed at increasing output and boost earnings by 25 per cent. The project seeks to transform the way coffee is produced and marketed in its member countries to reach leading buyers. Farmers in coffee producing countries in eastern Africa will be handed a lifeline through the five-year initiative being implemented under the Common Fund Commodities (CFC) by the Eastern Africa Fine Coffees Association (EAFCA). Diminishing acreage About Sh370 million has been channelled to the verification and certification project...

- ECX director hints the problem is temporary By Hayal Alemayehu The Reporter June 05, 2010 Major coffee traders who supply the beans to the local market complain that they could not get the full amount of coffee they buy at the Ethiopian Commodity Exchange (ECX) warehouses while the VAT payment for the missing stock is not returned to them in time. “When we buy, say, a 100 quintal of coffee, we end up getting 80 or 90 quintals,” said a coffee trader on condition of anonymity because the person is not entitled to give information to the press. “We do not only fail to receive the full amount of the stock we buy but also suffer from the fact that we are not getting back the VAT payment for the missing stock in time, which will hurt our business.” Owing to such challenges, scores coffee traders who supply the local market are entering the contraband market, according to some of traders at the ECX. Due to warehouse moisture, the coffee stored at the warehouses will naturally f...

By Muluken Yewondwossen Capital Ethiopia May 29, 2010 (VOLUME 12 NO. 597) Some of the Ethiopian Commodity Exchange’s (ECX) trading members have complained about the trading system and other facilities of the new system, but ECX officials have rejected the complaints. Some of the coffee traders Capital interviewed said from time to time the exchange is failing in terms of the trading system, quality grading, warehousing facility and payment resettlement. The traders also blamed the ECX for suspending the establishment of an association that was initially given the green light by the Ethiopian Commodity Exchange Authority, which has a mandate to give a right to form trade associations and control the trading activities. The traders, who demanded anonymity, said the National Exchange Actors Association (NEAA) formed by members of the ECX in August last year was given six months to form the association, call a general assembly and to elect board members, but the association was su...

Note :   The most recent developments on Starbucks vs. Ethiopia are listed below: January 9, 2012:  Has trademarking doubled Ethiopian farmers' income?   January 5, 2012:   Starbucks to showcase use of a QR code to trace Organic Ethiopia Sidamo® Coffee   ========= "When two elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. When the same two elephants make love, the grass still suffers." - derivative of an old African saying Life, before and after the agreement, remains unaffected for farmer Gemede Robe, the icon of the Starbucks vs. Ethiopia dispute. He lives in the Borena zone of the Oromia region, one of the many coffee growing zones of the country. (Photo: Courtesy of Oxfam America) By Wondwossen Mezlekia May 31, 2010 The coffee trademark dispute between Starbucks and Ethiopia officially ended exactly three years ago. In June 2007, the giant coffee chain and the government of Ethiopia declared their agreement "to work together to license...

Rising temperatures put 30 pct of coffee land at risk Scientists trying to help farmers adapt By Sarah Grainger Reuters May 19, 2010 SAN LUCAS TOLIMAN, Guatemala - Mexico and Central America could lose around a third of land suitable to grow coffee as global warming hurts conditions for the best quality beans, a study of regional farms shows. Specialty arabica coffee, the pride of countries like Guatemala, grows inside a very narrow band of altitude and temperature making it particularly sensitive to small changes in the climate. At the current rate temperatures are rising, there could be at least a 30 percent net loss in land suitable to farm coffee in Mexico and Central America by 2050 forcing many farmers to turn to different crops, said Peter Laderach, a lead researcher at the International Center for Tropical Agriculture. Laderach, whose organization is based in Colombia, is leading a team of scientists who started studying 7,000 small farms in Guatemala, Mexico, El ...

By Elizabeth Campbell Bloomberg May 19, 2010 Cocoa fell for the first time this week on signs that Europe’s debt crisis may spread and reduce investor demand for commodities. Coffee also dropped. Commodity prices declined to a 10-month low after Germany’s ban on some speculative financial sales raised concerns that debts in Europe will brake economic growth and lower demand for raw materials. The Standard & Poor’s GSCI Index of 24 items fell for the fifth straight session and earlier reached the lowest level since July 17. “Basically, outside elements are putting pressure across the board on all commodities,” said Phil Streible, a senior market strategist at Lind-Waldock, a broker in Chicago. “It just seems like risk is being taken off the table.” Cocoa for July delivery fell $12, or 0.4 percent, to $2,837 a metric ton at 11:47 a.m. on ICE Futures U.S. in New York. Before today, the chocolate ingredient declined 13 percent this year. Cocoa hasn’t fallen further “beca...