Forecast Coffee & Cocoa Market For Today & Review Market ( 22 feb 2011) : cocoa ends at 32-year peak, arabica off 30-yr peak

    * Brazil in no rush to sell coffee as prices surge

    * Ouattara seeks extension of Ivory Coast cocoa export ban

    * Sugar boosted by prospect of European Union imports

    NEW YORK/LONDON, Feb 22 (Reuters) - U.S. cocoa futures rose on Tuesday, closing at the highest level in 32 years on further  turmoil in top grower Ivory Coast, while arabica coffee futures  slipped from the highest levels in more than three decades.

    Sugar settled lower, giving back early gains.

    Cocoa futures have been rising as the crisis in Ivory Coast  has led to a virtual halt to exports. Presidential claimant  Alassane Ouattara extended the export ban to March 10.

    "That obviously tightens supply in the market," said  Sterling Smith, analyst with Country Hedging in Minnesota.

    Cocoa arrivals at ports in top grower Ivory Coast slowed to 5,000 tonnes last week and exporters expected them to seize up  completely as bank closures leave them with no liquidity to pay

farmers.

    "The situation is not getting any better," said Kona Haque,  commodity strategist at Macquarie Bank. "I think the risks are  rising for short-term supply disruptions."

    May cocoa futures on ICE <CCc2> soared $87 or 2.5 percent to finish at $3,586 per tonne, the highest close for the second  position since February 1979. The session high reached $3,608.

    The May premium to July <CCN1> closed at a steep $64, from  $47 in the last session.

    Prices on Liffe also advanced with May <LCCc2> closing up  52 pounds or 2.3 percent at 2,338 pounds a tonne after hitting  2,355 pounds, the highest level for the second month since July  2010.

    Coffee prices, which have doubled since June 2010, rose to  the highest levels in more than 30 years before the buying  exhausted itself on a lack of follow-through and as day traders  got out of the market, dealers said.

    The rise has been driven by three consecutive below-par  crops in Colombia, the top producer of high quality washed  arabica beans, while the world's number one coffee grower  Brazil is heading into the off-year in its biennial crop  cycle.

    May arabica futures <KCc2> rose 1.35 cents to finish at  $2.7435 per lb, the highest settlement for the second position  since May 1997. The contract hit an intraday peak at $2.7840,  the highest for the second position in more than 30 years, in  light volume as market participants focused on the larger metal  and energy markets.

    GLOBAL COFFEE DEFICIT

    "Buyers are desperately looking for available supplies,"  F.O. Licht analyst Stefan Uhlenbrock, noting a Brazil off-year  alone was enough to cause a deficit in the global coffee  market.

    Dealers said the next major upside target was $3.00 per  lb.

    "There is every possibility that prices will reach that  level ($3.00). We are far away from solving the overall supply  uncertainties," Uhlenbrock said.

    Brazil is holding back its big bean stocks and hoping for  improved market conditions in a wager that world prices will  keep on rising, its top coffee official said last week.

    "Physical (coffee) prices are still very strong, and Brazil  is in no rush to sell," Haque said. "A good chunk of the  farmers are pretty much sold out anyway."

    Robusta coffee futures on Liffe also rose with May <LRCc2>  peaking at $2,417 a tonne, the highest level for the second  month since March 2008. The contract closed down $5 at $2,382 a  tonne.

    The premium of arabica over robusta was around $1.67, the  highest level in more than two years.

    Raw sugar reversed lower, initially boosted by the prospect  of increased imports into the European Union and strength from  the rallying crude oil market. Late-day weakness came from  spillover pressure from the grains trading on the Chicago Board of Trade, on worries about unrest in Libya, while the commodity  complex <.CRB> pared its gains.

    A European Union committee will vote on Thursday on whether  to open a new import quota for sugar at reduced duties, to ease  a supply shortage on the EU market, the European Commission

said on Monday. [ID:nLDE71K1II]

    The most-active ICE May raw sugar contract <SBK1> inched  down 0.04 cent to finish at 28.38 cents per lb while May whites  on Liffe <LSUc1> fell $5.50 to close at $719 per tonne.

Source:   ((marcy.nicholson@thomsonreuters.com; +1 646 223 6043; Reuters Messaging: marcy.nicholson.reuters.com@reuters.net))

Quattara to extend Ivory Coast Ban

* Export ban to be extended to March 15

   * Ban was initially proposed from Jan. 24 for one month

   * Ivorian tension sent cocoa to highest in about 30 years

ABIDJAN, Feb 22 (Reuters) - Ivory Coast presidential claimant Alassane Ouattara will extend until March 10 the period of the ban he has called on cocoa exports to try to unseat his rival, a spokesman for his government said on Tuesday.

   The ban, initially proposed from Jan. 24 for one month, has been largely heeded by exporters even though Ouattara remains holed up in a hotel while incumbent Laurent Gbagbo holds onto power in the top cocoa producing country.

   "Yes, the step to ban the exports of cocoa will be extended from tomorrow until March 10. That is all I know," Patrick Achi, a spokesman for Ouattara's government said.

   Ouattara beat Gbagbo in a Nov. 28 presidential election, according to U.N.-certified results, but Gbagbo has refused to go, defying international condemnation and Western sanctions.

   African leaders are currently in Ivory Coast seeking an end to the standoff but hopes of a breakthrough are low and the absence of West African leaders highlighted the difficulty of forging a united African position on the crisis. [ID:nLDE71L113]

   Gbagbo retains the support of the military and controls most state institutions, including cocoa regulators and the ports.

   But Ouattara has warned exporters that, assuming he comes to power, they would be sanctioned if they cooperated with Gbagbo's government by paying export taxes to ship their beans.

   Exporters face the added dilemma of European Union sanctions on a number of Ivorian institutions backing Gbagbo and the combined measures have contributed to the drying up of exports.

   The turmoil in Ivory Coast has driven cocoa futures <CCc2> to the highest levels in more than three decades. [ID:nLDE71L1AB] (Reporting by Ange Aboa; writing by David Lewis; editing by Anthony Barker) ((Dakar Newsroom +221 338645076))

 Keywords: COCOA IVORYCOAST/BAN 

India 2010-11 Arabica Output Unlikely Above 80,000 Tons - Growers' Body

India's arabica coffee output is unlikely to be more than 80,000 metric tons in this crop year, partly hurt by unseasonal rainfall during November and December, the Karnataka Planters' Association said Thursday.

The key coffee-growing areas of Chikmagalur, Hassan and Kodagu in the southern state of Karnataka have reported a high drop in their crop harvested, with only a few pockets picking an average crop, Sahadev Balakrishna, chairman of the growers' body, said in a statement.

India's arabica production in the crop year that began Oct. 1 was estimated at 90,000 tons at the start of harvest in December, he added.

Balakrishna said more than 90% of the arabica harvest is estimated to have been completed in Karnataka, the country's largest coffee-producing region.

Arabica is usually harvested from mid-November, but arrivals were delayed this year by around two weeks due to the rains.

In December, the state-run Coffee Board forecast India's 2010-11 arabica output at 95,000 tons. The country produced 94,600 tons of arabica last year.

Arabica is mainly used in premium coffees, while robusta is blended with arabica beans for a lower-cost option for brewed coffee, or processed into instant coffee.

A fall in arabica production will lower India's total coffee output and may hurt shipments from Asia's third-largest coffee exporter and further tighten global supplies at a time when demand is robust and prices are at multi-year highs.

Industry executives estimate India's 2010-11 total coffee output to be around 284,000 tons, down 5% from the Coffee Board's estimate of 299,000 tons.

The country produced 289,600 tons of coffee last year.

The South Asian nation exports about two-thirds of its production. Italy, Russia, Germany and Belgium together account for more than half of India's total coffee shipments. 

source: http://coffeeasean.org/details.asp?Object=5&News_ID=18235709

Italy Bought 25% Of Cameroon 09-10 Robusta, Top Of 21 Purchasers

taly was the biggest purchaser of Cameroon's 2009-2010 robusta harvest buying 25% of the crop and topping a list of 21 nations that bought coffee last season, a report released Monday by commodity watchdog, the National Cocoa and Coffee Board, said.

"Through its port of Trieste, Italy was recorded as the main destination of our robusta coffee exports in the 2009-2010 season," said the report, which had Belgium as the second largest importer, buying 13% of Cameroon's robusta.

Next in descending order were Tunisia, Portugal and Germany.

Cameroon produced 46,083 metric tons of robusta in the season, up from 30,044 tons in the 2008-2009 season.

The West African country exported 44,966 metric tons of robusta in 2009-2010, up from 29,350 tons shipped out in the last season.

The report comes less than a week after Cameroon's minister of trade Luc Magloire Mbarga Atangana opened the 2010-2011 coffee season. The robusta coffee season in Cameroon officially runs from December of each year through November of the next year. 

source : http://coffeeasean.org/details.asp?Object=5&news_ID=22283784

Cocoa Rises to Highest Price Since 1979 on Ivory Coast Concern

Cocoa rose to a 32-year high in New York on concern that supplies from Ivory Coast, the world’s biggest producer, will continue to be disrupted as an export ban of the chocolate ingredient is extended.
Alassan Ouattara, the internationally recognized winner of the November presidential elections, will extend a ban that was imposed Jan. 23 and scheduled to expire this week, according to Malick Tohe, a cocoa adviser to Quattara. Before today, the commodity has gained 25 percent since late November.
“With no end to the political problems in sight, prices will remain buoyant,” said Jack Scoville, a vice president at Price Futures Group Inc. in Chicago. “Exports from the country are impossible, so people are worried about deterioration of the beans.”
Cocoa for May delivery climbed $87, or 2.5 percent, to settle at $3,586 a metric ton at 12 p.m. on ICE Futures U.S. in New York, after touching $3,608, the highest price since January 1979. Trading was closed yesterday for the U.S. Presidents Day holiday.
Scoville said he expects the price to rise to $3,655 by the end of this week.
In London, cocoa for March delivery rose 61 pounds, or 2.7 percent, to 2,362 pounds ($3,808) a ton on NYSE Liffe.
In Ivory Coast’s main port of Abidjan, the army has “reinforced the deployment” of troops to help keep order, Hilaire Babri Gohourou, an army spokesman, said on state-owned Radio Television Ivoirienne yesterday. At least 300 people have been killed in clashes since the vote, according to the United Nations.
Shipments of cocoa beans and processed cocoa products registered at Ivory Coast’s ports for export totaled 662,409 tons from start of the season on Oct. 1 through Feb. 17, according to an industry official with access to the data. In the 14 days to Feb. 17, cocoa-bean exports totaled 8,645 tons, said the official, who declined to be identified because the data are confidential.

source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-02-22/cocoa-advances-to-highest-price-since-1979-on-ivory-coast-supply-concerns.html

UPDATE: SOFTS-ICE coffee, cocoa at highest in more than 30 years

* Brazil in no rush to sell coffee as prices surge

* Ivory Coast cocoa exports dry up as crisis deepens

* Sugar boosted by prospect of European Union imports

(Adds quotes, bylines, background)

By Sarah McFarlane and Nigel Hunt

LONDON, Feb 22 (Reuters) - Cocoa and arabica coffee futures
rose to the highest levels in more than three decades on ICE on
Tuesday, with cocoa driven by turmoil in top grower Ivory Coast
and coffee by tight supplies of high quality beans.

Cocoa futures have been rising as the crisis in Ivory Coast
has shut down international banks and has led to a virtual halt
in exports.

Ivorian troops killed at least six protesters who were
calling on Laurent Gbagbo to step down as leader on Monday,
witnesses said, as African presidents charged with resolving the
crisis met the incumbent in Abidjan. [ID:nLDE71K1E6]

"The situation is not getting any better," said Kona Haque,
commodity strategist at Macquarie Bank. "I think the risks are
rising for short-term supply disruptions."

May cocoa futures on ICE CCc2 stood $38 or 1.1 percent
higher at $3,537 a tonne after rising earlier to a 32-year peak
for the second month of $3,574.

Prices on Liffe also advanced with May LCCc2 up 28 pounds
or 1.2 percent at 2,314 pounds a tonne.

In a bid to starve Gbagbo's government of funding from the
cocoa trade, rival Alassane Ouattara has called on exporters to
suspend business during the month of February and has left open
the option of a longer embargo, which dealers fear could cause
major problems for global cocoa supplies.

"There's a big risk of the ban being extended into the
mid-crop," Haque said.

COFFEE, SUGAR 

Coffee prices have doubled since June 2010 with supplies
tightened by three consecutive below-par harvests in Colombia,
the world's top producer of high quality washed arabica beans.

"Physical (coffee) prices are still very strong, and Brazil
are in no rush to sell," Haque said. "A good chunk of the
farmers are pretty much sold out anyway."

May arabica futures KCc2 stood 2.00 cents or 0.7 percent
higher at $2.75 per lb at 1200 GMT. The contract earlier peaked
at $2.78 per lb, the highest level for the second month in more
than 30 years.

Coffee prices soared to record levels in 1977 after severe
frost cut the 1976/77 Brazilian crop to around 9.3 million bags
from an expected 22 million.

Dealers said that buying by roasters was limiting any
downward moves.

"Roasters seem to be not as well covered as was thought,
given you see buying every time the market dips," Haque said.

Robusta coffee futures on Liffe also rose with May LRCc2
peaking at $2,417 a tonne, the highest level for the second
month since March 2008. Prices subsequently slipped back to
$2,392 a tonne, still up $5 or 0.2 percent.

Sugar prices were also higher, boosted by the prospect of
increased imports into the European Union.

A European Union committee will vote on Thursday on whether
to open a new import quota for sugar at reduced duties, to ease
a supply shortage on the EU market, the European Commission said
on Monday. [ID:nLDE71K1II]

"The strength of the markets this morning may be as a result
of a vote by an EU committee on Thursday on whether to open a
new import quota for sugar at reduced duties to ease a current
supply shortage," Sucden Financial said in a market note.

"If approved, there would be increased imports of both
whites and raw sugar from the world market," Sucden added.

March raw sugar futures on ICE SBc1 rose 0.32 cent or 1.0
percent to 31.34 cents a lb while May whites on Liffe LSUc1
climbed $3.80 to $728.30 per tonne.
 

source: http://af.reuters.com/article/commoditiesNews/idAFLDE71L1AB20110222 

VIETNAM: Coffee-Prices rise, farmers keep beans

Vietnamese robusta coffee have risen around 6 percent in the past week to a new record high following gains in global market, prompting farmers to further hold back sales, traders said on Tuesday.
Robusta beans rose to new all-time highs of between 44.5 million dong and 45 million dong ($2,132-$2,156) per tonne on the domestic market, from 42.2 million dong a week ago, which was itself a record.
Liffe May robusta coffee closed up $32 at $2,337 a tonne on Monday after peaking at a 2-1/2 year high for the second month of $2,358. The market was supported by a surge in arabica prices.
An increase of 20.6 percent since the end of 2010 has brought local prices in Vietnam, the world's largest producer of robusta beans, closer to the level of 50 million dong per tonne at which farmers are expected to unload more beans, traders said.
"They still hold 30 percent of the crop and are not selling," an exporter in the key growing province of Daklak said, based on his output estimate of 1 million tonnes, or 16.67 million bags.
Vietnam has shipped 300,000 tonnes and another 400,000 tonnes were kept in warehouses of foreign buyers and exporters, he said.
His estimate is well below an International Coffee Organization's data of 18.43 million 60-kg bags.
DONG DEVALUATION
The all-time high is in local currency terms. The dong was devalued by 8.5 percent against the dollar on Feb. 11.
Vietnamese robusta beans grade 2, 5 percent black and broken rose to $2,240-$2,250 a tonne, free-on-board, from $2,135-$2,145 last Tuesday, as discounts to London's May contract stood unchanged at $140-$150 a tonne.
Higher prices have prompted farmers to slow sales, a trader in Ho Chi Minh City said.
Prices have nearly doubled from 22.5 million dong per tonne in Daklak on Feb. 23, 2010. The province accounts for about a third of Vietnam's total coffee.
WATERING UNDER WAY
Farmers in the Central Highlands coffee belt are due to start a second phase of tree watering soon for the 2011/2012 crop.
The watering process and fertiliser feeding often last from February to early May before the rainy season returns to the area, which produces about 80 percent of Vietnam's coffee.
The region is forecast to face a severe drought this year, which could affect coffee output, the ruling Communist Part-run Nhan Dan (People) daily quoted the Agriculture Ministry as saying. It gave no forecast damages.
The watering process, in three or four phases of around 20 days at a time, is essential to coffee flowering as it helps trees cope with the peak of the dry season in March.
Vietnam's coffee crop year lasts from October to September, starting with a four-month harvest.
Initial reports said some cherries did not contain solid beans inside, suggesting the next crop may not be good, Chairman Luong Van Tu of the Vietnam Coffee and Cocoa Association said last week in his first comments on the next crop.
Growers were scrambling for diesel to run water pumps as many fill-in stations in the Central Highlands have suspended sales or stopped selling diesel and only offered petrol in preparations for a retail price hike, state-run media reported.
"Now the fuel shortage is not really the farmers concern because coffee prices are high. Their attention is the extent of the price rally," the Daklak-based exporter said.
($1=20,875 dong)

Gambling on food prices could be an unhealthy wager

Speculation and scarcity, droughts and floods add up to a crisis.
STOP playing with your food! That's a childhood lesson banks and investors should remember. They have helped create the global food crisis, putting upward pressure on inflation, threatening world peace and toppling governments.
Index funds and commodity providers have provided access to the fast-moving price of food. In the past year, the prices of wheat, corn and coffee have risen beyond 2008 levels. This helped create the volatile component that produced outrage in the streets of Egypt, Libya and elsewhere in the Middle East.
A Credit Suisse analysis found that Egypt spends more on food than other emerging economies - about 40 per cent of individual monthly income, compared with about 17 per cent for Brazilians and about 20 per cent for Chinese and Saudi Arabians. The food crisis also ousted the government in Tunisia and forced the Jordanian king to replace his government.

Advertisement: Story continues below

Certainly wild weather around the world has disrupted agricultural production but there are other forces equally as disturbing. They might point to another financial meltdown.
In recent weeks, some have blamed the food crisis on US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke and his quantitative easing policies. Ever since QE2 was announced in November, commodity prices have surged. Critics say it flooded the world with liquidity, which in turn devalued the dollar and drove institutional investors out of US treasuries and encouraged them to seek higher returns for food commodities.
Speculation has also contributed to the food crisis, an explanation for a situation where a billion people around the world face starvation when one in 10 of the population is obese.
For many years food was regarded as a bad speculative investment because it was perishable. Enter Goldman Sachs in the early 1990s. Recognising that it could make millions from our daily bread, it established the Goldman Sachs Commodities Index that took commodities like coffee, cattle, cocoa and corn and calculated their investment value.
Other investment banks followed and, as a result, there was a significant shift in investment in the first 10 years of this century. Following the equity bear market of 2000-02, commodity futures were identified as a new asset class for institutional investment.
Commodities behave differently from equities and bonds, creating more diversification for a given level of risk. Driving it further were changes in the 1990s, after lobbying by banks, hedge funds and free-market champions in the US and Britain, when regulations on commodity markets were abolished and contracts to buy and sell foods were turned into ''derivatives'' that could be traded by people who knew nothing about agriculture.
Analysts say that assets related to commodity trading index strategies rose from $US13 billion at the end of 2003, to $US260 billion in March 2008.
This is the way it worked. Instead of placing buy and sell orders, the banks tended to "go long" and bought, for example, wheat futures, rolling over contracts. With supply and demand forces, prices go up when supply is low, but in this case, they rose because Goldman Sachs and the banks created artificial demand. From 2006, food prices began rising, culminating in food riots around the world in 2008.
With food and energy emerging as the defining issues of 2011, we can expect further political heat will be generated. Head of the Group of 20, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, has already called for rules to curb commodity volatility.
Still, it's not just the speculators that have driven up food prices. The food crisis is also the product of the recent floods, cyclones and droughts, and scarcities of good land, energy, nutrients, technology and fish, as well as population growth, rising consumer demand and protectionist trade policies.
A confluence of forces has created this crisis and, as a result, there is no silver bullet. It will require global action similar to the kind now being attempted to combat climate change to rectify.
There is another danger. Speculators may well be creating the kind of price spikes and volatility last seen in the US housing bubble. Like other Wall Street quirks, it could end disastrously.
In the meantime, people will continue dying of hunger and governments will tremble. Sarkozy might have a point: the world needs to tackle the root causes of the crisis in Egypt before it takes hold of other nations or causes another crisis.

source: http://www.smh.com.au/business/gambling-on-food-prices-could-be-an-unhealthy-wager-20110221-1b2k9.html

Coffee to touch new highs on supply concerns

Coffee prices in the international market are expected to touch new highs in the near term on the back of tight supply coupled with speculation buying before a possible correction in the next six to nine months.
While arabica prices in ICE Futures are now at 14-year high of $2.72 a pound for March delivery, robusta is at $2,290 a tonne for March delivery in Liffe futures.

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“Due to supply concerns in Brazil and Columbia, two major producers of arabica, prices are expected to reach $2.90 a pound in the near term,” Ramesh Rajah, president of Coffee Exporters’ Association said. Though speculation buying along with holding back of stocks are fueling such price rise, arabica prices will see correction in the next six to nine months, he added.
Meantime, robusta variety of coffee may also firm up in the future due to higher consumption demand and speculation buying.
“Though robusta will not see much upside, it may reach $2,400 a tonne in the next three months before a correction,” Rajah said.
Along with supply constraints, falling inventory level will support this trend. According to the International Coffee Organisation, stocks registered with New York’s coffee exchange have fallen sharply in the last one year.
As physical beans from Colombia and Central America are being traded at a premium to New York exchange, traders are unlikely to give their produce to warehouse of the exchange.
“In the wake of the overall demand-supply scenario along with increase in consumption, prices of both variety of coffee have an upward bias in the near future,” Jawaid Akhtar, chairman of Coffee Board of India said. He, however, declined to give any specific figure saying that it would depend not only on demand-supply scenario, but also on the overall market sentiment. Meantime, price difference between arabica and robusta variety has touched an all-time high level after 1997 in the recent time, which may prompt planters to shift to arabica variety.
“Though a bigger price difference should trigger shifting to arabica variety, higher gestation period of four to five years of arabica will discourage planters to opt for this variety,” Marvin Rodrigues, vice-president of Karnataka Planters’ Association said.
He also said that growing arabica was difficult as compared to robusta due to higher labour requirement and other factors.
Despite high international prices, coffee retailers are not ready to pass on the price rise to end consumers yet.
“We know that prices are at all-time high. However, retail prices are not expected to follow suit as we procure most of our produce from captive estates,” K Ramakrishnan, marketing head of Cafe Coffee Day said. He also said retail prices had to follow a stable cycle for sound business growth.
source:
http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/coffee-to-touch-new-highssupply-concerns/425974/

Vietnam coffee prices rise to all-time high

   HANOI, Feb 22 (Reuters) - Vietnamese robusta coffee rose on Tuesday to between 44.5 million dong and 45 million dong ($2,132-$2,156) per tonne on the domestic market, hitting a record high following gains in global markets.

   Prices in Vietnam, the world's largest producer of robusta beans, were up from 42.2 million dong a week ago, which was itself a record as London futures traded at a 2-1/2-year high, supported by a surge in arabica prices.

   An increase of 20.6 percent since the end of 2010 has brought local prices closer to the level of 50 million dong per tonne at which farmers are expected to unload more beans, traders said.

   The all-time high is in local currency terms. The dong <VND=VN> was devalued by 8.5 percent against the dollar on Feb. 11.

   Farmers in the Central Highlands coffee belt are due to start a second phase of tree watering soon for the 2011/2012 crop.

   The watering process and fertiliser feeding often last from  February to early May before the rainy season returns to the area, which produces about 80 percent of Vietnam's coffee.

   The watering process, in three or four phases of around 20 days at a time, is essential to coffee flowering as it helps trees cope with the peak of the dry season in March.

   Vietnam's coffee crop year lasts from October to September, starting with a four-month harvest.

   Initial reports said some cherries did not contain solid beans inside, suggesting the next crop may not be good, Chairman Luong Van Tu of the Vietnam Coffee and Cocoa Association said last week in his first comments on the next crop. [ID:nHAN312381] ($1=20,875 dong)

Source:  (Reporting by Ho Binh Minh; Editing by Alan Raybould) ((ho.minh@thomsonreuters.com; +844 3825 9623; Reuters Messaging: ho.minh.reuters.com@reuters.net)) ((If you have a query or comment on this story, send an email to news.feedback.asia@thomsonreuters.com)) Keywords: MARKETS VIETNAM/COFFEE 

Market Close Review : Robusta coffee hits 2-1/2 year high, supplies tight

    * Consumption growth triggers robusta coffee deficit

    * Cocoa supported by turmoil in top grower Ivory Coast

    * Sugar market awaits news on Indian exports

    

    LONDON, Feb 21 (Reuters) - Robusta coffee futures climbed to  a fresh 2-1/2 year high on Monday as the market retained its  strong upward momentum, dealers said.

    Cocoa futures on Liffe rose to 7-month highs as the market  eyed the deepening crisis in top grower Ivory Coast.   

    White sugar edged up in a modest rebound after the steep  setback in prices during the last couple of weeks.

    ICE markets were shut on Monday for U.S. Presidents' Day.

     "There's a lot of positive sentiment towards the coffee   market," said Andrea Thompson, analyst at CoffeeNetwork, noting  consumption growth was pushing the robusta market into deficit.

    May robusta coffee <LRCc2> ended $50 or 2.1 percent higher  at $2,387 a tonne. It earlier peaked at $2,389, the highest  level for the second month since July 2008.

    The advance in coffee has been led by ICE arabica futures  <KCc2> which gained 7.1 percent last week and rose to their  highest levels since May 1997, boosted by tight supplies  following several below-par harvests in key producer Colombia.

    High arabica prices have encouraged roasters to increase the  volume of cheaper robusta beans in blends where possible.

    "2010-11 should have been the third consecutive global  surplus for robusta but it's now looking at a deficit. The  

Vietnam crop is fairly stable, it's really more the consumption  growth (driving the deficit)," Thompson said.

    Vietnam is the world's top producer of robusta coffee.

    Brazil, the world's biggest coffee producer, is holding back  its big bean stocks and hoping for improved market conditions in  a wager that world prices will keep on rising, its top coffee

official said on Friday.

    

    PROTESTERS KILLED

    Cocoa futures rose as tensions in Ivory Coast showed no sign  of easing and port arrivals slowed to a trickle, heightening   concern about supply from the world's top grower.

    Ivorian troops killed at least four protesters calling on  Laurent Gbagbo to step down as leader on Monday, witnesses said,  as African presidents charged with resolving Ivory Coast's  crisis arrived in Abidjan.

    European Union sanctions and an export ban imposed by  presidential claimant Alassane Ouattara have severely disrupted  shipments of cocoa out of Ivory Coast.  

    "Restriction to the flow of cocoa from the ports is no doubt  having an effect with numbers ranging from 200-300,000 tonnes  going nowhere, although allegedly smuggling is taking place," a  London-based broker said.

    May cocoa on Liffe <LCCc2> ended 23 pounds higher at 2,286 pounds a tonne after earlier touching 2,297 pounds, the highest  level for the second month since July 2010.

    White sugar futures were slightly higher with the market  still keenly awaiting a decision from India on whether to export  500,000 tonnes under Open General License (OGL).

    In December, India's farm minister had said mills could  export 500,000 tonnes of sugar under OGL. But the government,  bowing to public pressure over food prices, has referred the  issue to a panel of ministers.

    May whites <LSUc1> rose $3.90 to end at $724.50 a tonne  although prices remained far below a record peak for the front  month of $857.00 set on Feb. 2.

    The market has been weighed partly by expectations there may  be a significant supply response to high prices. Consultancy  Kingman on Sunday forecast a global sugar surplus of 5.6 million  tonnes in 2011/12 (April/March). 

    Kingsman cautioned, however, that 2011/12 crop estimates  should be viewed in light of very low global sugar stocks and  climatic volatility.

    "It will take months for the market situation to noticeably  ease and a slump in prices is therefore not on the cards for the  time being," Commerzbank said in a market report on Monday which  noted the Kingsman forecast.

Source: ((nigel.hunt@reuters.com ; +44 207 542 8421; Reuters Messaging: nigel.hunt.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net ))