Recently, there are many questions surrounding the announcements of foreign organizations, such as Reuters, USDA or even a certain foreign company, about the season and seasonal information. Vietnamese coffee service.
see more: > The volatility of the coffee market depends on what factors?
Recently, there has been a rumor about the “domestic trade” or USDA representative offices saying this and that… Well, let’s try to do a decoding to see how they did it?
First, let’s try to learn about how they collect information, which is how a foreign representative office is doing.
Everyone knows that the crop year of Vietnamese coffee begins in October of this year and ends in September of the following year. The first difference that needs to be distinguished is the statistics. Foreign companies make statistics according to the seasons, like this crop year they will use the phrase “year 2010-2011” and the statistics offices of Vietnam will make statistics according to the plan year, from January to May. 12. So when reading the newspapers, the reports, the numbers at home and abroad are slurred and of course a person who is not in the reading industry will be very difficult to understand!
Regarding information, foreign companies always pay attention to the following information, and then they have used this information very effectively in doing business.
1. Weather
They made a spreadsheet with clear statistics on monthly rainfall (some companies also follow weekly), number of sunny days, light intensity, length of sunny days…
2. Calculate output
Of course they can’t know the exact output, but the numbers they give are “always approximate and very reliable”. The way to do it is also very simple – that is to go.. ask farmers and do test samples.
Of course not everyone can ask. They do it like this, Vietnam has about 560,000 hectares (2011 data), some areas in the key areas they will ask representatives of 2 farmers, then summarize and correct the error and… will have 1 result. essay.
Test sample: this is called sampling to “recheck” the results asked by farmers. Through such sampling, it is possible to determine relative “yield” and “quality” when the coffee cherries are still on the branch and green!
3. Calculate the cost of 1 kg of coffee
They will calculate “the cost of 1 kg of coffee that farmers actually produce”. This is very important because when buying and selling, if you know the break-even price of the seller, it is difficult for the seller to … challenge!
How to calculate the cost? It’s also simple, by calculating what fertilizer the farmer fertilizes? How many times? How much each time? Or how to water? Are there rivers or streams or dug wells…. then from there we will have … the cost. However, the difference between a foreign company that calculates the cost and a civil servant who calculates the cost is: The foreign company includes the Live Cost (roughly understood as the farmer’s daily living money). product price.
What does this price mean? it will be easy to have the answer, but for buyers, they are interested: if they buy how much will people sell? This question is easy or difficult depending on how you think.
4. Make a spreadsheet about the buying and selling scenario
After having all the above information, these forecasters will compare with the “seasonal movements” and “customs and habits” of their farmers to “temporarily calculate” a trading and quantity scenario. goods that farmers will sell at certain times…
5. Credit Information
Talking about this seems a bit strange, but very important, in the past, Vietnamese farmers used to “sell young” to get money to buy agricultural supplies or simply buy rice to cook rice. Now life has changed, farmers are less likely to do this… but agents and warehouses are still there… so it’s also an important piece of information.
Because this category is very broad, the writer will divide it into several parts and write according to your own feedback. So if you want, you can give feedback, I will continue writing. This is part I, the part about farmers, I will continue to write part II, the part about companies, processing facilities…
Continue reading part 2: Seasonal survey, how did they do? (next)
Pham Vy (Giacaphe.com)
