TWO private coffee manufacturing companies in Myanmar have signed agreements to export their products to China through normal trade channels, said company officials.

Premier Coffee Company, which produces the Premier brand, and Golden Key Co., Ltd, which produces the Java brand, signed memorandums of understanding with Chinese companies after exhibiting their goods at the 13th China Kunming Import and Export Commodities Fair 2005, held in China’s Yunnan Province from June 6 to 10.

According to the MOUs, Premier and Golden Key will export 50 tonnes and 10,000 cartons of coffee a month, respectively.

Premier plans to finalise its agreement with Kunming Land Trading Company in July, while Golden Key plans do the same with another Chinese company within six months.

“Our company has already exported instant coffee mix to Bangladesh, Thailand and China via border trade, but this will be the first time we export via normal trade,” said Ma Khin Win Maw, the general manager of Golden Key.

“(When the agreement has been finalised) we will export about 10,000 cartons of three-in-one coffee a month,” she said.

“We still need to negotiate import duty and trading procedures,” she said.

People at the Kunming trade fair were interested in Myanmar coffee because it seemed tailor-made to the tastes of the Chinese, who prefer their coffee light and fairly sweet, said Ma Khin Win Maw.

“The imported instant coffee now available (in China) is a little bitter and stronger than Myanmar coffee, plus it is packaged in square sachets while ours comes in sticks, which can hold more grams of coffee,” she said.

“We guarantee a five-year shelf life for our products,” said Ma Khin Win Maw.
U Tun Yin, the managing director of Premier, said the company plans to export a range of products, including green and roasted coffee beans, once the final agreement has been made.

“This will be the first time we have exported our coffee, but we expect to find new markets in neighbouring countries like Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia in the future,” he said.

He said Myanmar’s packaging system meets international standards and the price is also very competitive – about 40 per cent cheaper than the coffee available in China.

U Tun Yin said new opportunities to export domestically produced coffee would encourage local coffee growers to increase production.

“To export coffee beans widely, we will need to grow more as the present planted acres are not sufficient to allow us to go on an exporting spree,” Ma Khin Min Maw said.

Coffee plantations covered 35,750 acres of land in Myanmar in the 2004-2005 financial year ending March 31, according to government figures.