SAO PAULO: Brazil's 2016-2017 coffee crop, now in the final days of harvest, is estimated at a bumper 54.9 million bags, according to a poll of industry insiders, who added that dry weather has yielded better quality beans than last year.
The survey of 11 forecasts from traders, exporters and analysts ranging from 47.8 million to 60 million bags comes a day before Brazil's official crop supply agency Conab is due to release its revised number early on Wednesday.
As the last of the late-maturing beans arrive in warehouses, most experts polled said the next crop (2017-2018) that is just beginning to flower will be smaller due to the biennial cycle of the coffee trees that produce smaller crops after big ones.
But some traders said the good rains that started over the coffee belt in recent days could end up triggering another big crop next year if they continue.
"It's too early to speak of next crop's numbers. If the rains stay favorable, we could see a solid crop with the potential to be as big as this crop," Gil Barabach, coffee specialist at crop analysts Safras & Mercado, said.
A median of estimates showed that the world's largest arabica coffee crop has recovered from two years of severe drought and yielded 43.8 million bags, surpassing the previous record in 2012.
Brazil's robusta crop, however, suffered its worst drought in recent history, and output of this lower quality bean is expected to be severely curtailed in 2017 as well, experts said, as scorched trees struggle to grow back lost foliage.
Output of robusta fell to 10.75 million bags this crop, specialists polled said, falling as much as 30 percent from the 2014/2015 record year for the crop, according to some estimates.
Brazil's arabica crop is concentrated in South Minas, with the bulk of the country's conillon crop coming from the northern half of Espirito Santo state.
Rasmus Wolthers, vice president of coffee exporter Wolthers and Associates in Santos, said warehouses in South Minas and Sao Paulo, a region that produces nearly 80 percent of Brazil's arabica crop, were brimming with the new crop beans.
"There was talk about the carryover stocks from 2015/16 in June, which ranged between 2 million bags and 8 million bags. Now, it looks from the tight warehouse capacity post harvest that it was probably closer to 8 million bags," he said.
Despite rains in early June at the start of harvest, coffee cooperatives are reporting dry conditions have favored the bulk of the curing of the world's biggest crop this year, which means better-tasting and higher-priced arabicas.
Carlos Paulino da Costa, president of Cooxupe - Brazil's largest coffee cooperative and exporter, said 70 percent of the
co-op's 5.4 million bags received this season has been good quality beans.
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.