ACPC urges RI to cut back on coffee exports
ACPC urges RI to cut back on coffee exports
JAKARTA (JP): The Association of Coffee Producing Countries
(ACPC) urged Indonesia on Monday to join its scheme to cut back
exports by 20 percent, pointing to hefty financial penalty for
members who refuse to comply.
ACPC "still expects Indonesia to join the retention plan that
has been agreed on by ACPC members," the group said in a
statement received here.
"Balance in the coffee market should benefit producers and
consumers alike, thereby assuring the future of a healthy world
coffee market and the sustainable development of coffee producing
nations," it said.
Indonesia refuses to take part in the scheme, which came into
force on June 1, arguing that its exports declined 14 percent
this year to about 300,000 tons because of production shortfalls.
ACPC said the retention plan was supervised and controlled by
a management committee, "which has the power to take sanctions
against faulty participants, including a financial penalty
proportional to the value of the coffee that has been exported in
violation of the plan."
The Association of Indonesian Coffee Exporters (AICE) was not
available to comment on the latest ACPC appeal.
AICE chairman Oesman Soedargo said last month that the
association had financial difficulties in setting up storage
facilities and allocating reserve funds to support the scheme.
He blamed bad weather for the decline in production to about
420,000 tons this year from an annual average of 500,000 tons.
AICE Secretary-General Noer Madjid told Antara on Monday that
rampant plundering of coffee beans in production centers in East
Java, Lampung and South Sumatra would deprive Indonesia of
between US$600 million and $700 million in coffee export earnings
this year.
The glut in the world market had caused a sharp drop in the
price of robusta coffee to 90 U.S. cents a kilogram in June, from
an average of $1.2 a kilogram last year, according to AICE.
Indonesia is the world's third largest coffee producer after
Brazil and Colombia, and the world's second largest producer of
robusta coffee.
ACPC groups Angola, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, the Ivory
Coast, the Congo, El Salvador, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Tanzania,
Togo, Uganda and Venezuela. Together, they control about 85
percent of the world's supply. (10)