Vietnam, the world's largest robusta producer, exported 132,400 tonnes (2.2 million 60-kg bags) of coffee in January, a drop of 5.6 percent from a year earlier, the Vietnam Customs said on Thursday, below market expectations. The January volume brought Vietnam's coffee export shipment in October 2014-January 2015, the first four months of the current 2014/2015 crop year, to 427,600 tonnes, up 2 percent from a year ago, based on government data.
The coffee crop year lasts between October and September. Traders had earlier forecast January's coffee exports at 150,000 tonnes while the government estimated it at 120,000 tonnes.