Landfill kills coffee fields in Dak Lak

VietNamNet Bridge – While local people in Dak Lak province affirm that the waste burning in the nearby landfill leads to the failure of coffee crops, the provincial agencies affirm the incineration has no relation with the crop failure.

The households in Buon Ho town in Dak Lak province, the “coffee capital city” of Vietnam, have lodged a complaint to competent agencies that the existence of the landfill in the town has made them become penniless.

They said that since 2011, the coffee and pepper fields near the landfill have seen the yield decreasing dramatically by 80 percent, affirming that the continuous garbage burning has wilted the plants.

The coffee plants in the area can only exist in rainy season. The green plants which grow well thanks to the rain in rainy season and people’s care, get withered in the fumigation.

Pham Van Hong, a farmer in Ea Blang commune, said he could harvest some 2 tons of coffee from his 0.5 hectares of coffee field. However, since the day the landfill appeared, he can get some 500 kilos every year only.

Earlier this year, Hong estimated that he would harvest 300 kilos of dry pepper. However, the pepper crop has failed.

“The coffee crop failure repeatedly occurs,” Hong said. “When it rains, the coffee plants grow well. But when the garbage is burnt, the plants get denuded again.”

“No creature can survive such a heat,” he continued.

Vi Van Duong, Pham Van Hai, the other farmers in Ea Drong commune, have also affirmed that the garbage burning has killed their coffee plants. The coffee fields closer to the landfill suffer heavier losses.

Here on the landfill, garbage is piled up and burnt, generating big smoke which brings the bad odor to everywhere.

However, the local farmers said they can live together with the bad odor. The only thing they want is no more incineration. “We just want to save our coffee crops. And we don’t want to leave our homeland,” Hong said.

The water sources around the landfill have become seriously polluted due to the unreasonable landfill. As fishes cannot live in the polluted water, local farmers cannot earn their living on fish farming any more.

While local farmers blamed the garbage incineration on the failure of coffee crops, the local authorities turn a deaf ear to their complaints.

Only after many times of making complaints, have the coffee growers received the reply from the local people’s committee. Pham Phu Loc, Deputy Chair of the Buon Ho Town said the incineration has not affected the crops.

Nguyen Bach Khoa, Director of the local urban and environment management company, believes that people complain about the landfill just because they want to give back the land to the state to get compensation.

Doan Van Dung, Deputy Head of the local sub-department of natural resources and the environment, while confirming that the garbage burning causes smoke, said it is still unclear how it affects the crops.

Dung went on to say that one cannot say about the damage with just bare eyes, and that it is necessary to measure the pollution with machines.

However, the problem is that no one and no agency comes forward to measure the pollution and find out how the landfill affects the agriculture production.

Dan Viet

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Coffee Falls to One-Week Low on Vietnam Tet Sales; Sugar Drops

By Isis Almeida December 17, 2013

Robusta coffee fell to a one-week low in London as farmers in Vietnam, the world’s largest producer of the robusta variety, increase sales before Tet, the festival that marks the Lunar New Year. Sugar retreated.

Growers will sell 30 percent of their crop before Tet in late January, according to a Bloomberg survey of 12 traders and analysts published on Dec. 11. Sales were 10 percent to 12 percent of the harvest last week, Volcafe, the coffee unit of commodities trader ED&F Man Holdings Ltd. said in a Dec. 13 report. Farmer selling is “picking up,” the trader said.

“Increased sales from Vietnamese producers are expected over the coming weeks,” Sterling Smith, a futures specialist at Citigroup Inc. in Chicago, said in a report e-mailed yesterday. “This should contain prices.” Farmers in Vietnam usually accelerate sales to obtain cash before the Tet holidays.

STORY: In London, Black Friday Lasts All December

Robusta coffee for March delivery dropped 2.3 percent to $1,728 a metric ton by 12:19 p.m. on NYSE Liffe in London. The price touched $1,727 a ton, the lowest for a most-active contract since Dec. 10. Arabica coffee for March delivery fell 1 percent to $1.142 a pound on ICE Futures U.S. in New York, on trading volumes that were 19 percent higher than the 100-day average for this time of day.

The beans used to make instant coffee and espresso fell 10 percent this year partly as traders anticipated a record crop from Vietnam. The southeast Asian nation will produce 29 million bags of 60 kilograms in the 2013-14 season started Oct. 1, estimates Kona Haque, a London-based analyst at Macquarie Group Ltd., Australia’s biggest investment bank.

Vietnam Exports

Coffee exports from Vietnam advanced 31 percent to 80,372 tons in November from a month earlier, the General Customs Department said on its website yesterday. Vietnamese beans for January and February shipments were last week at a premium of $30 a ton over the futures price, down from $50 a ton a week earlier, Volcafe said in the Dec. 13 report.

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Vietnam Coffee Premium Seen by Volcafe Sliding as Sales Pick Up

By Isis Almeida  Dec 16, 2013 7:11 PM GMT+0800

Coffee beans from Vietnam, the world’s biggest grower of the robusta variety, are trading at a smaller premium as farmer sales are “picking up” and buyers are reluctant to pay as much, according to Volcafe Ltd.

Vietnamese beans for shipment in January and February were at a premium of $30 a metric ton to the futures on NYSE Liffe last week, the unit of commodities trader ED&F Man Holdings Ltd., said in a report e-mailed on Dec. 13. That compares with $50 a ton a week earlier. The beans used to make instant coffee and espresso gained for five consecutive weeks, the longest weekly advance since March 2011, as stockpiles tumbled.

“Differentials are easing versus the nearby months on Liffe as buyers are reluctant to pay the premium,” the Winterthur, Switzerland-based trader said, referring to the amount paid for physical coffee in relation to the price in the futures market. “Vietnamese farmer selling is picking up.”

Robusta coffee futures fell 8 percent this year partly as traders anticipated a record crop in Vietnam. The Southeast Asian nation will produce a record 30 million bags in the 2013-14 season started Oct. 1, Volcafe estimates. Prices rebounded last month as stockpiles in warehouses tracked by the exchange tumbled and shipments from Vietnam slowed.

Inventories of the variety fell 32 percent to 31,420 tons in the two weeks to Dec. 9, exchange data showed. That was the lowest level since at least 2002. Shipments from Vietnam declined to 61,155 tons and 80,000 tons in October and November, according to the General Statistics Office. That’s down from 102,000 tons and 122,000 tons a year earlier.

Sales

“Farmers sold around 10 percent to 12 percent so far,” Volcafe said, commenting on this season’s crop. “With six weeks to go before Tet, we should see some good volume hit the market during this time,” the trader said, referring to the festival that marks the Lunar New Year. Farmers usually boost sales before Tet.

In Indonesia, the third-biggest robusta grower, bean deliveries from farms accelerated to about 1,700 tons last week, Volcafe said. That compares with 1,500 tons a week earlier, data from the trader showed.

Indonesian coffee for shipment in January and February was at a premium of $190 a ton to the London futures last week, unchanged from a week earlier, according to the report.

“Local suppliers are reluctant to sell and prefer to keep the goods and monitor the market development,” the trader said. “Due to expensive differentials and end of season, almost no activity seen in the export market.”

A bag of coffee weighs 60 kilograms (132 pounds).

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If you like coffee, let’s go to Buon Ma Thuot

VietNamNet Bridge – Not only Buon Ma Thuot city, Dak Lak province has coffee, but enjoying coffee here, you will feel the characteristic taste of the majestic Central Highlands.

You can enjoy many different types of coffee in Buon Ma Thuot. Photo: VNE

Anyone who visits this Central Highlands city wants to enjoy the characterized coffee taste of Buon Ma Thuot. Though you cannot clearly define the taste but if you try it once, you will never forget that special scent.

In the city that is considered as the capital of coffee in Vietnam, inviting friends to a coffee shop has become culture and lifestyle. Cafés are present in almost every street in Buon Ma Thuot, from the main road as Le Thanh Tong, Ngo Quyen, Mai Hac De, Nguyen Du, Phan Chu Trinh to small alleys.

Each coffee shop has a different name, different style and different customers. If Nguyen Bar is preferred by teenagers, Bang Khuang is for the middle-aged.

There are coffee shops which serve customers with ready-made coffee, but on-the-spot processed coffee is more favored in this land. Whenever customers enter the shops, the waiters begin roasting, grinding coffee beans and processing coffee.

You will have to be patient waiting for you cup of coffee. But watching how Buon Ma Thuot people process a cup of coffee is very interesting.

For those who are still wondering in choosing a coffee shop among hundreds of cafes in the city, they can quickly go to the coffee village on Le Thanh Tong Street, a miniature coffee capital in the heart of Buon Ma Thuot. You can choose from many different flavors such as weasel coffee, fresh coffee or ready-made coffee.

It is not easy to identify which shop has the best coffee among hundreds of large and small coffee shops in this Central Highlands city. Just know that, in the lower temperature at night in Buon Ma Thuot, chatting with friends besides a hot coffee cup is an unforgettable experience.

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Robusta Coffee Spread Gains to Record on Vietnam; Cocoa Retreats

By Isis Almeida  Dec 9, 2013 8:31

The premium robusta coffee for delivery in January commands over the March futures climbed to a record, signaling tightening supplies as shipments fall from leading producer Vietnam and stockpiles dwindle. Cocoa dropped.

The beans used to make instant coffee and espresso for January delivery climbed to as much as $49 a metric ton above the March futures, a record since the spread started trading in July 2012. Vietnam’s coffee exports fell in the past two months and robusta stockpiles in warehouses tracked by NYSE Liffe are at the lowest since at least 2002, data on Bloomberg showed.

“The spot month has been supported by limited flow of Vietnamese 2013-14 crop,” Andrea Thompson, head of research and analysis at CoffeeNetwork, a unit of brokerage INTL FCStone Inc., said by phone today from Belfast, Northern Ireland. “The Liffe certified stocks have been the main source of robusta stocks and they continue to decline.”

Robusta coffee for January delivery gained 2.1 percent to $1,758 a ton by 12:14 p.m. on NYSE Liffe in London. The spread between the January and March futures was trading at $45 a ton from $30 a ton a week earlier. That market structure, in which earlier-dated contracts are priced higher than deferred ones, is known as backwardation and may signal limited supplies.

Vietnamese coffee exports in October and November were just over 150,000 tons, down from 240,000 tons a year earlier, Volcafe, a unit of commodities trader ED&F Man Holdings Ltd., said in a Dec. 6 report. Bean stockpiles in Ho Chi Minh City increased during both months and carryover inventories in the hands of farmers were among the highest ever, the trader added.

Inventories in NYSE Liffe-tracked warehouses were 45,900 tons as of Nov. 25. That’s below the 52,000 tons a Bloomberg survey of 10 traders published in August forecast for the end of the year. The exchange will update inventories this week.

Arabica Consolidation

In New York, arabica coffee for delivery in March was 0.6 percent higher at $1.07 a pound on ICE Futures U.S. Futures trading volumes were about average for the past 100 days for the time of day, data compiled by Bloomberg showed.

“Arabica has started to consolidate, but this is more to do with spillover strength from robusta, where certified stocks are falling,” Kona Haque, an analyst at Macquarie Group Ltd. in London, said in a report e-mailed today. She forecast prices may drop to 90 cents a pound next year partly on supplies from Brazil, the world’s largest producer of all coffee varieties.

“With incremental roaster demand still skewed toward robusta, we recommend staying short arabica,” Haque said.

Refined, or white, sugar for March delivery rose 0.6 percent to $451.20 a ton in London. Raw sugar for March delivery was 0.9 percent higher at 16.74 cents a pound in New York.

Cocoa for delivery in March fell 0.6 percent to 1,752 pounds ($2,870) a ton on NYSE Liffe. Cocoa for delivery in the same month slid 0.4 percent to $2,793 a ton on ICE.

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