Exceeded the high of the 70s
Coffee hit a record high in New York amid growing concerns about a global supply shortage.
“Arabica futures rose 4.6% to $3,454 a pound as of 9:30 a.m. in New York,” the publication said in early December. “Prices surpassed the previous all-time high set in 1977, when the market was shaken by a devastating 1975 frost in Brazil that affected the harvest.”
According to Bloomberg, Arabica futures have risen more than 80% this year amid crop failures in key producing countries.
Large trader Volcafe Ltd. reduced its production forecast for Brazil, the world’s largest supplier (Brazil produces 40% of the world’s coffee, both Arabica and Robusta), after a crop survey showed the impact of a prolonged drought that lasted from April to September. Lack of moisture and falling leaves prevented trees from setting fruit.
“The country will produce only 34.4 million bags of Arabica,” the publication said. It noted that this is about 11 million bags less than forecast in September. “Global coffee production could fall short of demand by 8.5 million bags in the 2025-26 season, marking an unprecedented fifth year of deficit.”
All this adds to concerns about coffee output in Vietnam, the largest producer of Robusta. They say that here the regions of the "coffee belt" were first affected by drought during the growth of coffee trees, and at the harvest stage, heavy rains worsened the situation. As a result, the price of robusta reached record levels.
Coffee is currently the most expensive in the last decade.
Leading researcher at the Institute of Agrarian Economics Bohdan Dukhnytskyi notes that in Ukraine, prices for fragrant grains began to increase since the beginning of 2022.
"The main reason for this trend is the increase in coffee prices on world markets due to adverse weather conditions and low yields in the leading producing countries of this crop. These are, first of all, Brazil, Colombia, Vietnam and Indonesia. Since our country is entirely dependent on imported supplies of this product, global trends directly affect the Ukrainian food market," he explained.
Regional Director of the marketing research company 4Service Group, Viktoriya Skorbota, notes that the coffee market was also affected by a global disruption in supply chains, namely a shortage of containers for transporting beans. Because producers and roasters – companies that process coffee beans into a product suitable for consumption – are often located in different countries.
In addition, according to her, exporting countries had their own global internal problems, which in one way or another affected the situation with coffee.
For the Ukrainian coffee market, an additional painful blow was the full-scale war, which disrupted logistics chains and, ultimately, increased the cost of delivery.
Analysts note that during the full-scale invasion, there was a sharp jump in prices, as a result of which the average cost of a cup of espresso in the country increased from 20 to 28 hryvnias in 2022 alone.
The cost of all coffee brands on the shelves of domestic supermarkets is also increasing.
Currently, precious coffee beans are traded in the world at the highest prices in the last decade. And this is far from the limit.
"If we add to this a significant decrease in its reserves due to greater consumption relative to production over the last two seasons, then almost all forecasts indicate a further increase in prices in this segment," says expert Dukhnytsky.
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