The Vietnam Coffee Corporation (Vinacafe) plans to increase the export proportion of high-quality coffee this year to account for around 20-30 per cent of the country’s total coffee export revenues.
The corporation has also targeted a rise of its export quantities and revenues, which make up approximately 35 per cent of Vietnam’s export market share.
To this end, Vinacafe has focused on its coffee growing areas in order to stabilize production and reduce production costs from the beginning of this year.
Irrigation systems are also being repaired and upgraded by the corporation, thus providing enough water for its coffee plantation.
In addition, VINACAFE is hoping to establish a storehouse in Europe to directly supply coffee for processors and customers. At the same time, a consultative and trade center is being built to provide coffee export companies with up-to-date market prices and foreign trade skills.
In related news, the government has recently approved an overall plan to restructure Vinacafe through equitization and arranging the state-owned member enterprises between now and 2010.
Accordingly, as many as 46 members of Vinacafe will be equitized, sold, dissolved, or even bankrupted, said an official from the corporation.
The official also added the equitization process of Vinacafe is slow. Only 20 per cent of its members have gone public so far while the deadline for the process is the end of 2006.
The remaining coffee farms of state-owned enterprises under Vinacafe will be invested in inline with stabilizing productivity, reducing prices and replacing Robusta coffee with Arabica coffee in some areas, he said.
At present, Vinacafe plays an important role in processing, consuming and exporting coffee and setting up trademarks for Vietnamese coffee in the international market.
Members of the corporation are expected to ship 230,000 tons of coffee abroad this year, raking in an earning of US$160 million.
Vinacafe now has the biggest area of concentrated coffee farming in Vietnam, with 20,000ha, mainly in the central highlands region.
Vietnam Economic Times
Vietnamese
