Global coffee exports down 12% in Apr: ICO

Second month of decline, coffee exports were down 7% in March

World coffee exports declined by nearly 12% to 8.77 million bags in April this year, International Coffee Organisation (ICO) has said.

The worldwide overseas shipments of the brew stood at 9.93 million bags of 60 kg each in the same month of 2011.

This is the second straight month of decline in exports of the brew after global export volumes rose by 7% to 9.32 million bags in February, 2012 from 8.67 million bags in the year-ago period.

World coffee shipments declined by almost 7% to 9.88 million bags in March, 2012 from 10.59 million bags in the year-ago period.

In the first seven months of the current coffee year, exports fell by 4% to 60.3 million bags from 62.83 million bags in the October-April period of the 2010-11 coffee year.

Coffee year lasts from October to September.

For the 12 month period ending April 2012, total coffee shipments were down at 101.99 million bags as against 103.35 million bags in the year-ago period.

According to the global body on coffee, exports in the first half of the 2011-12 coffee year fell by 2.3% to 51.7 million bags from 52.9 million bags in the 2010-11 coffee year mainly on account of drop in shipments by Brazil and Columbia.