Prices of Kenyan coffee dipped on Tuesday amid dwindling demand from key European and North AmericaN markets because of hot weather, traders said. Countries in North America and Europe, who consume the bulk of Kenyan coffee, are in summer and hot weather has led coffee drinkers to switch to cold drinks, traders said.
The average price for this week's market was $92.80 per 50-kg bag compared with $97.87 at last week's auction.
"There was limited demand from overseas and this is normal, it is seasonal. A lot of people are on holiday and it's very hot in the northern hemisphere and coffee consumption is low," Charles Cardoso, the managing director of CETCO, a leading coffee exporting company, said.
The coffee beans offered at the auction were a mixture of old and new crop, with quality also varying.
"It's a mixture of old and lower main crop lots, and then some fresher fly crop coffee, but even though the coffee is fresher, the quality is still a little bit disappointing," Cardoso said.
One further sale is left before the auction takes a break for a month in August.
Nairobi Coffee Exchange (NCE) said in a market report that the prices of the two top grades dipped.
AA fetched an average price of $143.05 per 50-kg bag, compared to last week's price of $159.13. AB fetched an average price of $113.25 per bag, slightly lower than $113.81 at last week's auction.
Although not a big coffee producer, Kenya is famous globally for its high quality Arabica beans grown mainly near Mount Kenya and used by roasters to blend coffees from other origins.
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