The price of coffee soars, jumping on Tuesday to a ten-year high on the International Exchange in New York: $2,50 for a pound of arabica coming from the Brazilian plantations or from the Ethiopian highlands, marred by the civil war. But this is not the only misfortune that explains the increase in raw material prices, which have practically doubled since the beginning of the year. Thanks to the "bottlenecks" that are holding back logistics at all latitudes and the problems caused by the climate, the premises have been created for imbalances destined to upset the market in the next or perhaps even later, with the prospect that the irreplaceable cup of “ristretto” at the bar could become one of the most widespread examples of the increase in inflation that is knocking at the door.
The surge in futures prices on the New York market, according to experts, is not caused on this occasion by the speculative raids that periodically invest this commodity, exposed more than others to the whims of frost. This time behind the forward purchases there are the "physical" traders of coffee, worried about the risk of not being able to meet the demand. It's not just a question of production, even if the problems are not lacking in Brazil, as in Ethiopia and in Vietnam, leaders in the market of the less valuable robust quality. But in these weeks leading up to Christmas (the season of peak consumption) traders are struggling to find the ships to transport the goods to the ports of call, including Trieste, the leading market in Europe already tormented by no-vax unrest. In figures, according to the Coffee Exporters Council of Brazil, the most important organization globally, volumes of goods traveling last October were 24 percent lower than a year earlier.
Not only. The difficulty of finding a sea passage has not only caused a sharp increase in the price of freight charges for transport but has also favored the hoarding phenomenon by merchants and producers. “Many farmers – reads the bulletin of the US Department of Agriculture – are finding it more convenient to default, paying the penalties on the contracts signed at the time of him, and resell the goods at current prices,. That's twice as much." And soon even more as the forecasts speak of quotations above 3 dollars per pound as early as 2022, a year in which production risks being even lower than demand.
Several factors favor the bullish case. Starting from crop problems in Brazil, afflicted by drought, the harvest was marred in July by sudden frosts which didn't so much compromise the harvest as damaged the trees, making them more vulnerable to the arrival of the Nina, a harbinger of drought. In Vietnam, instead, the risk is represented by the risk of new outbreaks of contagion that are putting a strain on the entire economy of the last Asian tiger, from Gap sweaters (which perhaps won't arrive in the US in time for Christmas) to Robusta crops. AND ethiopia, key country for the supply of quality Arabica, is hit by the conflict.
In short, the cup of coffee will contribute to making the incoming wave of inflation less and less "transitory". Also because, in the face of the high cost of living, the response of the bartenders rises. After Amazon is Starbuck to be invested in these days by the request to create a union, a prospect against which the company has already mobilized a billion-dollar campaign.
