Vietnam coffee prices firm

Coffee prices in Vietnam were steady in the past week, but traders expect prices to firm by mid-February as farmers hold back the supply of fresh beans from the new harvest to boost prices.
Traders in Daklak, Vietnam's main growing province, said on Tuesday that a kilogram of robusta beans was quoted at between 21,800 dong and 21,900 dong ($1.35-$1.36), unchanged from last week's prices. "It is more difficult to buy now as growers have started to hold back the beans in expectation of higher prices of around 22,000 dong per kg next month," a trader in Ho Chi Minh City said.
Another trader in Daklak said sales would pick up in mid-February as growers need cash to prepare for the Tet Lunar New Year festival. Vietnamese robusta grade 2, 5 percent black and broken beans were offered at $120 a tonne below May contracts, similar to last week, or around $1,430 to $1,440 a tonne free on board at Saigon Port, slightly higher than last week's $1,430.
Last week, the government said the country's coffee exports in October to January, the first four months of the current crop year, would grow 32.6 percent from a year earlier to 6.23 million bags, with January earnings alone soaring 137 percent.
The General Statistics Office estimated that coffee exports this month would soar 85.3 percent on last January to 150,000 tonnes, or 2.5 million bags, earning $210 million.
Vietnam shipped 4.7 million bags between October 2005 and January 2006. Key buyers included trading firms and roasters in the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, Switzerland and Japan. Traders said Vietnamese growers completed harvesting a bumper crop in early January and some farmers had started watering and fertilising trees for the next production cycle.
The coffee crop year lasts between October and September. Most of Vietnam's coffee exports, ranking the world's second after Brazil, is the robusta variety used for instant coffee. The latest harvest is 11 percent higher than the previous crop, totalling at least 900,000 tonnes or 15 million bags, traders said. One bag contains 60 kg of coffee beans.
Vietnam would have around 8.7 million bags more for export, based on the crop output estimated at 15 million bags, domestic consumption of 0.83 million bags and stock carried over from the previous crop of at least 0.8 million bags.
Vietnam's coffee exports this calendar year are expected to rise 7 percent from last year to 910,000 tonnes or 15.2 million bags, industry and trade officials said.