Deficits in volume and value in the Brazilian balance of roasted coffee

World's largest producer and exporter of green coffee, the Brazil 2014 with the largest deficits close in recent history in its trade balance of roasted product, higher value-added. Not only imports will hit record on that front, both in volume and in revenues, as, in both cases, the purchases abroad will be greater than shipments, also an unprecedented combination.
As experts heard by the Value, the movement is directly influenced by the expansion of the internal market of capsules, still heavily dependent on imports. To a large extent thanks to the additional demand generated by this advance, from January to November have already landed in the country 2,254 tons of roasted coffee, 46% more than in the same range of 2013, according to data from the Bureau of foreign trade (Secex/Mdic) compiled by international Marketing P&A. In the same comparison, exports decreased by almost 15% and amounted to 1,524 tons.
If in the case of the volumes is the first time that Brazilian imports of roasted coffee outweigh exports, in the recipe is a tendency already observed since 2011, but that has been deepening (view infographic on the side), as says John Alberto Pascual Brando, Manager of P&A in the first 11 months of this year, those purchases cost $ 44,140 million, 47.8% more than in the same range of 2013While shipments fell 20.3 percent, to $ 11,219 million, according to data from Secex.
Largely due to the increase in imports of capsules, fairly valued in the international market, the average price of Brazilian imports of roasted coffee arrives, currently at $ 20 per pound, while the average price of exports of the country is around $ 7, according to the P&A.
Of 2,254 tons of roasted coffee imported by Brazil from January to November this year, 1.6 million have come in capsules-were about 350 million of them, considering an average quantity of 5 grams for each unit. Survey conducted by Nielsen at the request of the Associação Brasileira da Indústria de Café (Abic) shows that the capsules volume consumed in the domestic market it grew 52.4% from 2013 to 2014.
Based on projections of Euromonitor about the world consumption of coffee, Carlos Brando, Managing Director of P&A, estimates that there is a tendency that the market of capsules in Brazil to grow 20 percent annually in the next ten years. As the base is still small, he strengthens the stem tends to be vigorous.
Brando also notes that should be enough time for the Brazil to produce the capsules volume that is currently imported, even though there are already ongoing initiatives, promoted by several Brazilian and multinational companies, to raise domestic production.
The Nestlé Switzerland, for example, confirmed last week that it will build in Montes Claros, Minas Gerais, its first factory outside Europe capsules, as had anticipated the value PRO, real-time information service of Value. The 3corações also announced a unit of capsules in the same municipality. In addition to the two, small companies are already producing in Brazil.
The aggregation of value with the capsules is great, says Brando. While a pound of roasted coffee and traditional ground costs between $ 10 and $ 12, the same measure of capsules Valley between $ 250 and $ 300.
The Brazil has always been green coffee supplier, raw material which reaches the roasters of other countries-mainly Europeans, in addition to the USA-and is transformed by them into roasted and grinded product for export, with higher prices. According to Carlos Brando, this logic is hard to be modified, because Brazil does not have recognized brands in foreign markets.
Guilherme Braga, General Director of Brazil's coffee exporters (CeCafé), adds that, apart from the lack of recognized brands, another problem for the growth of Brazilian exports of ground roasted coffee is the cost of maintaining distribution out there beyond the competition with large companies that dominate the shelves in supermarkets. For him, a possibility of the Brazil raise the industrialized coffee shipments in the medium term is through múltis of businesses that may produce in the country.
According to the CeCafé, Brazilian exports of ground roasted decreased from 110,954 bags of 60 kilos in 2008, to 30,846 in 2013. This year, by November, the embedded volume shrank by 6.3% as compared to the same range of 2013, while shipments of green coffee increased by 17.7% to 29.909 million sacks.