São Paulo – Brazil exported 506,225 60-kg coffee bags to the Arab bloc year to date through May, up 50.2% from a year earlier, as per figures released by the Brazilian Coffee Exporters Council (Cecafé).
Of the bloc, Lebanon remains the top buyer of the Brazilian product. Lebanon’s year-to-date imports of coffee from Brazil climbed 80% from a year earlier. Other countries also saw a good performance like Jordan, which stepped up its purchases by 30%.
The Middle East also saw an increase in imports of the Brazilian product. Year to date through May, the region brought in 35.4% more coffee from the Latin American country. “In this region’s states, the consumption of Rio coffee is widespread. And Brazil is virtually the only country that grows Arabica coffee with such traits, thus being a loyal supplier for these countries,” Cecafé chairman Márcio Ferreira was quoted as saying in a statement.
Civil year
Total exports from Brazil, though, declined. Year to date through May, Brazil exported 13.577 million bags, down 19.3% from a year earlier. Foreign exchange revenue stood at USD 2.958 billion, down 24.4% year on year.
According to Ferreira, the harvest of the product neared 20% of the forecasted for May, some 10 percentual points below the last five years’ average. “This, coupled with the little coffee remaining from 202122 smaller harvests that were negatively impacted by adverse weather conditions — keeping in mind that May is the last month of the 2021-22 harvest affects this lower performance of exports,” he explained.
He notes that as coffee advances to the 2023-24 season, an increase in exports is likely to be seen in the following months. “The Brazilian coffee-growing regions were not impacted by the weather so far, and prospects are good for the new harvest, with importers showing a great interest in our Arabica coffees,” he said.
Translated by Guilherme Miranda
