India’s coffee export tumbles 10% in Q1 FY13

India’s coffee exports have tumbled 9.57 percent to 1.04 lakh tonnes in the first quarter of this fiscal as compared to 1.15 lakh tonnes of the brew shipped in the same quarter of previous fiscal. However, in terms of value, the exports declined marginally to Rs 1,560.76 crore in the first quarter of 2012-13 fiscal as compared to Rs 1,580.03 crore in the year-ago period.

Moreover, in the January-June period of the current calendar year, coffee shipments fell by 3.76 percent to 2.05 lakh tonnes from 2.13 lakh tonnes in the same period previous year. The exports of coffee have declined as farmers are holding their crop due to low global prices of arabica and lethargic demand from Europe following the economic slowdown.

Further, in the first nine months of the current coffee year (October-September), the exports fell by 5.40 percent to 2.63 lakh tonnes from 2.78 lakh tonnes in the corresponding period of 2010-11 marketing year.

Moreover, the world coffee consignments have fell from the beginning of the current season on the back of low opening stocks on account of record shipments in the 2010-11 coffee year and fall in production in the current crop year. The coffee year runs from October to September.

Earlier this year, the Coffee board has implemented various programmes and schemes to boost production, productivity and quality as well as for promotion of exports and value addition in the coffee sector. The various schemes being implemented by the board were Research & Development programmes for Sustainable Coffee Production; Development Support Scheme for Coffee; Rainfall Insurance Scheme for Risk Management to Coffee growers; Support for Mechanization of Farm Operations and Export Promotion scheme.