Cargill Cracks It! Breakthrough in Cocoa Powder for Cold Drink Applications

March 8, 2011,  A new product innovation in cocoa powder that greatly improves wettability and dispersability in cold drink mix applications has been made by Cargill's cocoa and chocolate business.

This development means Cargill's cocoa powder disappears twice as quickly below the surface of the cold liquid (wettability) and will disperse evenly throughout the liquid (dispersability).

As a result, drink mixes using Cargill's new dispersable cocoa powders are truly putting the 'instant' into instant cocoa drinks.

Crucially this performance will be maintained throughout the product's shelf life, something that doesn't hold true for existing products, which suffer from decreasing wettability as they near the end of their shelf life.

Deaths as Ivorian clashes continue

At least three people have been killed in the latest violence in Cote d'Ivoire, a day after forces loyal to Laurent Gbagbo, the disputed president confirmed that supporters of his rival Alassane Ouattara had seized a third town in the country's west.

Al Jazeera's Mohammed Adow, reporting from Abidjan, said Gbagbo's internal security minister announced on Tuesday that "three people were killed overnight in a suburb where both Ouattara and Gbagbo supporters live side by side".

The news came after Gbagbo supporters confirmed that rebels had taken control of the town of Touleleu.

UPDATE - Indonesia's weather agency says dry season to start May-June

* Palm oil, rubber, coffee areas in Sumatra to have drier weather in May
* Dry season in coal-producing Kalimantan to start in June
* Tin-producing Bangka island still to have rains until June 

JAKARTA, March 8 (Reuters) - Indonesia's dry season will start in most areas around May-June, earlier than the previous forecast of July and offering a timely boost to the country's agricultural and mineral sectors, the weather bureau said on Tuesday.

The dry season normally runs from April to Sept/Oct, but the country is in the middle of a wetter-than-expected rainy season that has affected plantation crops and could hit resource exploitation.

Vietnam's coffee shipments to jump in March-traders

* March shipments may rise by a third from February

* London robusta futures hit three-year high

Vietnam, the world's top robusta producer, could ship between 110,000 and 130,000 tonnes of coffee this month, or 1.83 million to 2.2 million bags, up from an estimated 90,000 tonnes last month, traders said on Tuesday.

Higher loading could bring some relief to traders who have expressed concern over deliveries because farmers held back beans as domestic prices rose. [London robusta futures hit a three-year high on Monday.

Loading in February was relatively low because of Tet, Vietnam's Lunar New Year festival. All markets were closed for about a week during the 28-day month.

COFFEE AND COCOA FORECAST FOR TODAY AND MARKET CLOSING REVIEW 7 MARCH 2011

 * Arabicas set market alight on chart-based buying
* Shortage of arabica beans spur rally
* Battles escalate in top cocoa grower Ivory Coast

Arabica coffee futures soared to a 34-year high Monday on investment fund buying as tight supplies and a paucity of producer sales ignited the market's most powerful rally since the end of January.

Cocoa futures moved higher as fighting escalated in top producer Ivory Coast while sugar rose in consolidation business.

Volumes in U.S. soft commodities were light, with sugar and cocoa running over 50 percent below their 30-day norms and even arabica coffee volume standing at a quarter below the norm, Thomson Reuters data showed.

Starbucks CEO eyes acquisition for consumer products

March 7 (Reuters) - Starbucks Corp may go for acquisitions over the next 12-18 months to expand its consumer products business, Chief Executive Howard Schultz told the Wall Street Journal in an interview.
 
Looking for growth beyond its namesake cafes, the world's biggest coffee chain has made clear its intentions to strike deals in the fast-growing single-cup brewing segment.
 
"We are building and investing in resources and people to build a significant consumer products business that over time will rival the size and scale of our retail company," Schultz told the Journal.
 
Schultz also told the daily that the company will not implement across-the-board price increases at this stage in spite of the volatility in coffee prices
 
He said the company had locked in coffee prices for 2011 to offset high prices.
Speaking about international expansion plans to the Journal, Schultz said there was "a large runway for growth and opportunity".
 
"We have an opportunity now to build thousands of stores in China. We're in a very good position to begin to look at India as the next market for Starbucks and we hope to get the first stores there open within 12 months," he told the paper.
Source: https://portal.hpd.global.reuters.com/

Kenya coffee prices delight farmers, dismay buyers

* Weather, global market boosts prices

* Buyers turn to other producers regionally

In Kenya's coffee growing area of Komothai, record prices at auction have farmers dreaming of a better future and driving to improve their crop.

Record high commodity prices have rattled finance ministeries in the West, but poor growers see things differently -- especially in Kenya where reforms now mean more profits trickle down to them.

Coffee from the local co-operative society fetched $1,011 per 50-kg bag in January, a heady price for any coffee farmer around the world.