By Andrea Welsh
BRASILIA, Brazil, Aug 25 (Reuters) - Brazil's 2006/07 (July/June) coffee crop is seen 2.5 percent higher at 41.57 million 60-kg bags, compared with 40.62 million bags estimated in April, the agriculture ministry said on Friday.
The world's biggest coffee grower and exporter will produce 26 percent more coffee than the 32.94 million bags in 2005/06.
In its third 2006/07 crop estimate, the government put arabica bean output at 32.06 million bags, up from 31.02 million bags seen in April, whilst robusta output was estimated at 9.51 million bags, against 9.60 million bags previously.
Brazil produced 23.82 million bags of arabicas and 9.13 million bags of robustas in 2005/06. "There's not much change in the general scenario (from the previous estimate)," Vilmondes Olegario da Silva, the ministry's director of coffee, told a news briefing.
Higher prices encouraged increased crop care, such as more fertilizer, pesticide and pruning, which resulted in a slight upwards revision of the crop. An upturn this year in arabica's biennial production cycle also boosted this year's crop.
Average yield was estimated at 19.43 bags per hectare, up 31 percent from last year, but the total productive area was 3.5 percent smaller at 2.14 million hectares, versus 2.22 million hectares in 2005/06.
Yields were excellent at 23 bags per hectare in south Minas and " the center-west of Minas Gerais state, which produce about 55 percent of the coffee in Brazil's No. 1 coffee state.
But yields were disappointing in forested coffee areas and in the robusta producing state of Rondonia.
An estimated 86 percent of Brazil's coffee crop will have been harvested by the end of August, Vilmondes said.
Looking ahead to next year's crop, he said that the winter had been extremely dry and trees were stressed.
"There's no reason to be alarmist, but we have already exceeded the level at which trees are vulnerable to drought," Vilmondes said.
He noted that the moisture deficit was now 220 millimeters (8.7 inches) and that trees are vulnerable at 150 mm.
"It's difficult to forecast...if it rains there could be recovery," he said.
Vilmondes forecast that Brazil would export 26 million bags of green and soluble coffee in 2006, after shipping 13.7 million bags between January and July.
He said stocks had declined since the end of March, when 9.7 million bags of coffee were stored privately and 2.6 million bags were held by the government's National Coffee Development Fund (Funcafe).
Traders and analysts expected a slight upward revision in the crop due to excellent harvesting conditions during an extremely dry Brazili an winter.
In June, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) put the Brazilian crop at 44.8 million bags -- the top end of trade guesstimates ranging from 42 million to 45 million bags.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment