Coffee Board breathes easy as morning showers stop

BANGALORE:
The morning time rainfalls which washed away the pollen grains on the first twenty-four hours of the
blossoming of the Arabica java harvest in Mysore on Saturday did not present an
encore on Lord'S Day and Monday. India’s Coffee Board
chairman GV Krishna Rau, who had on Saturday expressed serious concern if the
blossoms were hit by morning time rainfall on Lord'S Day and Monday, told ET: “Our
anxiety have been alleviated. The blossoming time period is for three days. The damage
has been confined to the first twenty-four hours and we gauge that not more than than 5,000
tonne of the approaching 2008-09 harvest will be lost.” (Harvesting of Arabica
beans gets in November.) Morning rainfalls on the years of
blossoming of the java harvest are dreaded because they rinse away the pollen
grains and pre-empt the procedure of fertilization and fructification into coffee
beans. Mysore turns almost 75% of India’s Arabica crop, accounting for
60,000 metric ton of the country’s 2007-08 Arabica harvest of 82,000 tonne, less
than expected because of a heavy monsoon. Officials were looking at a 2008-09
national Arabica harvest of 1,00,000
tonne. However, there were
heavy morning time rainfalls on the first of the three-day blossoming time period in almost
all Arabica-growing pockets in Mysore and there were anticipations that it
would rain down the adjacent two years also. The lone economy saving grace was that some 30% of
Karnataka’s Arabica harvest had blossomed in February. Which still left 70%
at risk. A one-fourth of the remaining 70% (17.5% of the overall Mysore crop)
blossomed on Saturday. And one-half of the remaining 70% (35% of the overall
Karnataka crop) blossomed on Sunday, and the balance on
Monday. The Coffee Board
chairman added: “The feedback from our men of science and extension-staff is
that there was nightlong rainfall in some pockets which continued on Lord'S Day morning. Fortunately, the rainfalls stopped by 9 am and there was bright sunlight for long
enough for the buds to flower without the pollen grains being washed away. And
Monday morning time was a comparatively rain-free day. There have been no studies of
rain on blossoming years in the Arabica-growing areas of Tamil Nadu. Neither
there have been studies of rainfall on the blossoming years in India’s
Robusta-growing areas, barring Nelliampathy (in Kerala’s Palghat district)
where 1,000 metric ton could be lost. The overall impact for the 2008-09 harvest is far
less serious than initially apprehended, especially for
Arabica.”

Uganda: Coffee Export Earnings Grow By 32 Percent - AllAfrica.com

Peter KaujjuKampala

COFFEE exportation gross in October rose by 32% to $17.6m.

The up-to-the-minute study from the Republic Of Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) said the volume was up by 10.9% compared to 155,571 bags shipped in October 2006.

UCDA attributed the improvement to high volumes of Robusta java which was up by 15% totalling 132,179 bags.

Arabica java measures on the other manus dropped by 0.4% owed to heavy rainfalls that delayed harvest home in some areas.

"Coffee cargo from Republic Of Uganda in the 10 calendar calendar months of the calendar year-2007 (Jan/Oct) amounted to 2.2m bags valued at $216.2m, up from 1.67m ($145.1m).

"In the last 12 months (November 2006-October 2007) cargo totalled 2.72m bags worth $261.3m, up from 2.04m ($ 174.4m) realised a twelvemonth ago," the study said.

On the local market, the heavy rainfalls during the calendar calendar month interrupted harvest home and drying of the beans.

This pushed farm gate terms to between sh1,000 and sh12,000 per kilogram of dry cherries of Robusta and sh2,500 per kilogram of Arabica.

On the planetary scene, the positive human race ingestion tendency against a background of a autumn in production is envisaged to travel on giving support to a terms rise.

Exports to the European Union increased to 147,564 bags during the month compared to 142,080 previously.

November exportations are estimated at 250,000, 3% above October volumes owed to higher farm-gate pillory and unfavourable weather.

Meanwhile, a commission involving exporters, UCDA and other government authorities have got been formed to counter larceny of java from containers in theodolite to Mombasa.

Many exporters have lost millions of Ugandan shillings to unscrupulous people who interrupt into containers, steal the java and replacing it with sand.

The cozenage is threatening the sector's credibleness on the international market.

It is safer for the java to go by railroad as opposing to route but most of the exporters utilize route conveyance because it takes about 10 years to acquire to Mombasa.

The rise java terms this twelvemonth could be one of the grounds for the thefts.

Robusta java is going for about $1.95 (sh3,354) a kilogram in London, from the $1.61 (sh2,769) a twelvemonth ago. Being a landlocked country, Uganda's greatest traditional export, coffee, have to travel through Mombasa. Many purchasers are concerned about Uganda's coffee, beginnings said.

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A UCDA functionary said recently that the larcenies were on the rise.

"Our authorization is to supervise the containers up to the boundary line and then they are in the custody of transporters. We are losing gross as government and assurance in our coffee.

"We are in contact with the Kenyan authorities. Something have to be done soon," the functionary said.