Poor Farmer

By Marvin G. Perez Bloomberg November 22, 2011  Coffee’s biggest slump in three years may be ending as weather damages crops from Colombia to Indonesia, reducing U.S. inventories to the lowest since 2000 just as Kraft Foods Inc. and J.M. Smucker Co. cut prices. Stockpiles in warehouses monitored by ICE Futures U.S. fell 16 percent since December, declining for a fourth year, exchange data show. Arabica-coffee futures, already poised for the highest annual average price on record, may rise 14 percent to $2.71 a pound by March, according to the average estimate of 13 traders and analysts surveyed by Bloomberg. Prices rallied 7.8 percent from a nine-month low in October as the heaviest rains in two decades damaged Central American plantations, Colombia reported a 19 percent drop in output last month, while exports slowed from Brazil, the world’s top grower. The London-based International Coffee Organization already expects production of arabica,...

Ban brings total prohibited from trading in coffee to 57 in the last month By Elleni Araya Addis Fortune November 20, 2011 The Ministry of Trade has banned 16 coffee exporters from trading on the trading floor of the Ethiopian Commodity Exchange (ECX) on Wednesday, November 8, 2011, for failure to have their stocks audited by it. The banned individuals and companies include Terefe Hailu (PhD), Kaf International, AbdulKedir Mohammad Ali, and Abdu Ali. Most of the banned traders are known for registering a high volume of trade in the exchange, according to officials from MOT.  A letter was sent to the Ethiopian Commodity Exchange Authority (ECEA), with the list of the banned traders, not to allow them from buying or selling on the trading floor for unspecified time. The ban only prevents the traders from buying coffee on the trading floor. It does not stop them from either buying or selling other commodities. This ban brings the total of banned exporters i...

By Allan Odhiambo Business Daily Africa November 20  2011  A farmer picks her coffee crop. Photo: Courtesy of Business Daily.  Some millers and roasters could be investigated for allegedly engaging in illegal dealings that are fuelling theft of beans in coffee growing areas across the country. The industry regulator, the Coffee Board of Kenya, said last Thursday if found guilty the millers and roasters would be stripped of their licences. “We have received claims of some millers and roasters allegedly engaging in dealings that are causing theft of coffee and we have forwarded the information to the relevant arms of government for action,” the board’s managing director, Loise Njeru, told a media briefing in Nairobi. Cases of theft and illegal dealing in the commodity have been on climb since the 2004/05 crop season, coinciding with a steady increase in prices that has persisted into this year. “Theft of coffee has become very serious especially a...

By Scott Shalaway Pittsburg Post Gazette November 20, 2011 Next time you're grocery shopping, try finding a bag of "environmentally friendly" coffee. But don't be fooled by deceptive packaging. Just because a bag has an image of a bird on it doesn't mean it's "green." Coffee drinking birders and conservationists can make a difference by purchasing coffee that is certified organic and "bird-friendly." Unfortunately these certifications can be confusing. The Smithsonian Institution's Migratory Bird Center's certification process is the gold standard. Begun in 1995 and based on years of scientific research, SMBC developed strict criteria for evaluating shade coffee farms. Independent third-party inspectors evaluate coffee farms. Only those that meet SMBC standards and are certified "organic" by the U.S. Department of Agriculture are eligible for bird friendly certification. Roasters that have earned the Bi...

Good Magazine November 16, 2011 Picture: Courtesy of Good Magazine On a rainy Wednesday afternoon in Venice, California, Dan Kougan spreads out three shot glasses in front of a curious audience. The champagne-colored liquid bubbling on the left is a homemade hops soda. The creamy, tan shot in the middle is a barley-chocolate malt topped with a tuft of steamed milk. And the chestnut-hued beverage on the right, the raison d’être of this whole ordeal, gives off the unmistakable scent of fresh espresso, extracted from the highest-quality coffee beans the developing world has to offer. “Thanks, Dan, I’m really excited!” says Elaine Levia. She smiles as she eyes the Flight of Three—the name given to the triptych of shot glasses on the glass-top bar before her. “Do you have drinking instructions?” she asks. Of course he does. For a month, Kougan has been planning the details of each beverage for his hops-themed menu. It’s his week to curate the Slow Bar, the backspace of...

By Leslie Patton Bloomberg November 17, 2011   Sept. 16, 2012, is D Day -- or at least K Day -- for  Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. (GMCR) That’s when it will lose the main patents on K-Cups, the coffee pods that helped make Green Mountain the largest player in the $1 billion-plus U.S. single-serve coffee market. Once the patents expire, competitors can make their own version of K-cups and threaten the prospects of a company already battling criticism from hedge fund manager  David Einhorn  that its market-share gains have peaked. Einhorn, president of Greenlight Capital Inc., declined to comment for this story and won’t say if his firm is shorting the stock. “New entrants into private label could hurt their volume,” said Bea Chiem, a San Francisco-based analyst at  Standard & Poor’s , who gives the company a B+ credit rating, four levels below investment grade. When the patents run out, it could also “open up the door for other ...