Multinational food giant Yunnan grabs "beans"

Su Bo, president of Nestle Greater China Food and Beverage Department, revealed on April 2 that Nestle will invest 100 million yuan in Pu 'er City, Yunnan Province to build storage and testing facilities, and this will become its largest coffee planting training base. Meanwhile, Starbucks, the international coffee chain giant, opened its first coffee grower support center in Asia four months ago in Pu 'er, Yunnan. In addition to Maxwell, Japan Shangdao Coffee Co., Ltd. and other enterprises that have entered in the early stage, the competition for Yunnan coffee raw materials by multinational food giants is constantly escalating.

Yunnan can grow Arabic coffee beans

According to Su Bo, the coffee cultivation training base will provide professional training for 5000 coffee farmers every year. The reporter learned that as early as the early 1990s, Nestle had begun to enter the Yunnan coffee market. As for the current procurement volume in Yunnan, although there is no official figure, according to the data released by the Agriculture Department of Yunnan Province in 2011, Nestle and Maxwell purchased 30% of the province's total output at that time.

This time again invested 100 million plus Yunnan coffee territory, Nestle's "ambition" to the Chinese coffee market is self-evident. Earlier, Nestle said it hoped to teach local coffee farmers to grow high-quality Arabic coffee beans, which was one of the original intentions of Yunnan's coffee-related investment plan. Both Nestle and Starbucks have built coffee farms in China for the first time in an attempt to develop them as suppliers of Arabic coffee. It is worth noting that other coffee-producing Asian countries are currently only able to supply lower-quality Robusta coffee.

Food giants flock in

In addition to Nestle, many food giants are accelerating to seize Yunnan coffee raw materials. Sources Yunnan Province Department of Agriculture information revealed that Nestle, Maxwell, Starbucks and other world coffee giants have opened raw material bases in Yunnan. At the end of 2010, Starbucks announced that it would invest in and operate its first coffee base in the world in Yunnan. Subsequently, Japan's U CC Ueshima Coffee Co., Ltd. signed a coffee bean purchase agreement with the largest local coffee giant, Hougu Coffee.

As for Maxwell's specific purchases in Yunnan, Kraft Food China Public Affairs Department said that Maxwell's coffee in China is imported, Yunnan coffee beans may be purchased from Europe's Kraft, but can not give the corresponding data before the deadline.

Starbucks, an international coffee chain, formed a joint venture with local coffee company Aini Group in February last year. The new joint venture, led by Starbucks, will buy and export high-quality Arabica coffee beans from Yunnan Province, and will also operate a coffee processing plant there.

It is noteworthy that Starbucks 'investment in Yunnan coffee raw materials is constantly increasing. Four months ago, Starbucks announced the opening of Asia's first coffee grower support center in Pu 'er, Yunnan Province, and local adaptation trials of four new coffee varieties first introduced by Starbucks in Yunnan three years ago are progressing smoothly. According to Starbucks 'plan, it plans to put these four coffee varieties into large-scale cultivation after the five-year adaptation experiment expires.

Yunnan, as a production area accounting for more than 90% of China's coffee production, has food giants piling up or also has the "shadow" of government concern. Coffee production rose 26.1 percent to 82,000 tons in 2012, according to the Agriculture Department of Yunnan Province. The government pointed out in the Industrial Development Plan that leading enterprises will be introduced to carry out in-depth development of coffee industry and expand the industrial chain.

Guo Fanli, senior researcher at CIC, said: "As the global economic center of gravity gradually shifts from the west to the east, the future competition in China's coffee market will further intensify, and Yunnan coffee market can help food giants gain more advantages in future competition." Guo Fanli said.

(Editor: Leo)