Coffee consumption grows in the Middle East, which is looking for Brazil – 11/29/2023 – Café na Prensa

Countries in the Middle East have significantly increased coffee consumption. Large producers, such as Brazil, are increasingly exporting to the region, which is seeing a multiplication of coffee shops and strong investments from companies and governments in the sector.

This year, from January to October, Brazil exported more than 2 million bags of coffee to countries in the Middle East, an increase of 50% compared to the same period last year.

Data provided to Coffee in the Press by the International Coffee Organization show that Saudi Arabia was one of those that saw the biggest increase in consumption of the drink. In 2000, the country was responsible for just 380 thousand bags. Twenty years later, it reached the level of 2 million bags.

Growing consumption has attracted the attention – and investment – ​​of multinationals in the sector. Report published by World Coffee Portal at the end of 2022 showed that the Middle East market grew 10.5% in 12 months.

The report says the Middle East has become “a key geography for major international coffee chains” and has seen the emergence and improvement of several local operators.

Alshaya Group, which operates Starbucks stores in the region, said it aims to reach 3,000 stores in the Middle East by 2028.

Currently, the company already operates around 2,000 units in countries such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and Kuwait. The goal is to open another 250 stores per year over the next five years.

In Saudi Arabia alone, Starbucks has 440 stores – more than double the total number of stores that existed in Brazil before the company that operates the franchise units on Brazilian soil filed for judicial recovery. In the UAE, there are almost 300 Starbucks coffee shops.

The Juan Valdez chain, a kind of Colombian Starbucks, also invests heavily in the region. The company announced that it will open its first store in the United Arab Emirates in December and that it already plans to reach a total of 100 units in the country.

In addition to importing increasingly larger amounts, Saudi Arabia is now beginning to invest heavily in cultivation. The Saudi government created the Saudi Coffee Company, a company financed by the country’s public investment fund, with the aim of transforming the local coffee industry.

In early November, the company announced the creation of a 1 million square meter model farm in Jazan, a port region in the southwest of the country. On this property, the Saudi Coffee Company said it intends to cultivate 5 million coffee trees by 2030.

The location of Arab countries also contributes to the region being an important hub for exporters. As it is close to countries that produce high quality coffee, such as Kenya and Ethiopia, traders based mainly in Dubai are able to buy beans from these origins and, from the port of Jebel Ali, in Dubai, export them to eastern countries with high demand for coffee. of quality, such as Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, for example.

In general, these coffees pass through the DMCC (Dubai Multi Commodities Centre), a free zone that functions as a hub for exporters of various commodities. The center has a coffee center with very sophisticated infrastructure, with storage, processing, roasting and even coffee packaging services.

“If you look at Taiwan, Korea and Singapore, more than 75% of Ethiopian specialty coffee in these three countries comes from Dubai and not Ethiopia,” says Saeed Alsuwaidi, director of agricultural commodities at DMCC.

This is explained precisely because the traders they buy coffee from Ethiopia — the sixth largest producer in the world — and process them in Dubai before exporting to these countries.

Alsuwaidi also says that the volume of coffee sold through DMCC grows by around 30% per year.

This geographical location makes the Middle East a place with a very large diversity of coffees. There are grains imported from Brazil and Colombia to those grown in Ethiopia and Kenya, for example. And this is one of the factors that has helped to develop the specialty coffee scene in the region, according to Alsuwaidi.

“If you want an original, easy coffee, Ethiopian style, fruity notes, you can find it here. If you want a Brazilian style coffee, you can find it here, and so on,” he says.

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