Figure 2: Coffee “C” Contract Price Quotes* vs. World Ending Stocks
*Futures Prices are multiplied by 100 for presentation. The Coffee Crop Year is July-June. The
futures price presented is the closing quote for final Friday of June for each year.
Source: Futures Prices obtained from NYBOT/CSCE; Ending Stocks obtained from USDA Tropical
Products: World Markets and Trade December 2003
Price volatility in the world coffee market is not unique to the latter part of the
twentieth century, and neither are attempts to regulate such fluctuations. Export
quotas have been utilized periodically since the 1940s by a conglomeration of
nations working together to reduce excess supplies or minimize the impact of falling
prices (Akiyama and Duncan 1982).
To better understand how such actions work, consider the tactics utilized by the
International Coffee Council during 1980. Faced with plummeting prices, the
Council implemented a policy of export quotas. Price ceilings and floors were
established in addition to these quotas. Quota levels had to be reduced from 58.19
million 60-kg. bags to 51.8 million 60-kg bags when the floor price of 1.15$US/lb.
exceeded the market price. Despite all of these efforts, the price continued to
plummet until colder than usual weather destroyed a large portion of Brazil’s 1981
coffee crop. The resulting reduction in world supply simultaneously generated an
increase in price (Akiyama and Duncan 1982). Brazil, because of its comparatively
high level of production (USDA/ERS 2002), is a country whose coffee situation
directly impacts that of the entire global coffee market.