Alexandre Rocha*
São Paulo – Brazilian green coffee exports to the main buyer markets in the Arab world grew in September. Shipments totalled 87,000 bags containing 60 kilograms of coffee against 77,600 in August, and revenues obtained rose from US$ 7.5 million to US$ 9.4 million. These figures were disclosed by the Brazilian Coffee Exporter Council (CeCafé).
In the same period, Brazilian coffee exports as a whole suffered a retraction from 2.8 million to 2.5 million bags. The reasons, according to the CeCafé, were the traffic jams and delays at the port of Santos (the largest port in Brazil) and the lack of containers at the ports of Vitória, in the state of Espírito Santo, and Rio de Janeiro, all three in southeastern Brazil. Brazil is the main producer and exporter of coffee in the world.
"In shipments to traditional markets, like the European and United States markets, we had some problems with the traffic of vessels and the lack of containers," said to ANBA the director general of the CeCafé, Guilherme Braga. Such problems, however, did not affect shipments to the Middle East and North Africa.
At the same time, Braga believes that the establishment of stocks that generally takes place before Ramadan, the holy month for the Muslims, positively influenced sales to the region in recent months. Ramadan began at the end of September and is going to end at the end of this month. "Whereas to other markets the shipments are always constant, to the Arab world there are periods in which volumes traded are greater," stated Braga.
Exports to the Arabs also grew when compared to the results for September last year, when shipment totalled 71,600 bags for US$ 6 million. The main destinations in the region are Lebanon and Syria, followed by Tunisia, Algeria, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Egypt.
In the accumulated result for the year, however, there has been a reduction in shipments to the Arabs. A total of 637,000 bags were shipped between January and September 2005, against 540,000 in the same period this year. Revenues with sales to the region, in turn, rose from US$ 53.7 million to US$ 51.3 million. Total Brazilian coffee sales in the period reached US$ 2.2 billion.
Forecasted growth
According to Braga, the reduction in the accumulated total for the year is due to the performance in the first half, when the previous coffee crop, a total of 32 million bags, was sold. That crop was smaller than the one being traded now, 44 million bags of coffee. He believes that this should be reverted and sales should end the year presenting growth. "In the first half of the year, we exported 11.5 million bags. For the second half, estimates are that sales should total 15.5 million bags," he said.
Although sales to the Arabs are small in percentage terms, Braga says that the region is a good market. According to him, the Arabs consume more Brazilian coffee than the figures show. This is because many sales are not made directly by Brazil, but are through intermediaries in Europe.
Generally, those who import green coffee directly are large industries, which have scale gains. "There are smaller companies that purchase the product from intermediaries. They start buying directly when their production rises and the price of freight is diluted into the volume purchased," explained the CeCafé director.
*Translated by Mark Ament
