Brazil accumulates 1,7 million bags of coffee without shipment in 2024

Brazilian coffee exporters continue to face intense logistical bottlenecks this year due to the lack of adequate infrastructure for containerized cargo in Brazilian ports. In 2024, multiple delays and constant changes in the scale of export vessels, in addition to frequent cargo rollovers, caused the country to accumulate 1,717 million bags – 5.203 containers – of the product not shipped by October. The data comes from a survey by the Brazilian Coffee Exporters Council (Cecafé) with associated exporters.

With an average FOB export price of US$ 285,21 per bag (green coffee) and the average dollar exchange rate of R$ 5,6235 in October, the non-shipment of these bags of coffee implies that the country failed to receive, in the first 10 months of 2024, US$ 489,72 million, or R$ 2,754 billion, as foreign exchange revenue.

Due to these logistical obstacles at Brazilian ports, coffee exporters have accumulated a “port loss” of R$6,986 million this year, which involves extra expenses with additional storage, detentions, pre-stacking and early gates.

“These bottlenecks and losses demonstrate that our ports have not evolved satisfactorily and in proportion to the growth of national agribusiness, especially in terms of serving products that are exported by container,” analyzes Eduardo Heron, technical director of Cecafé.

According to him, the entity has been making efforts to maintain dialogue with the various links in foreign trade, involving public authorities and the private sector, in the hope of finding solutions that mitigate and enable, “as soon as possible”, the optimization of the structure of the docks.

Heron notes that Brazil's port infrastructure has been showing signs of deterioration and that it is urgent that measures be taken to improve conditions, with a focus on efficiency and competitiveness, for exporters. "There is an urgent need to expand the capacity of the yard and berth, as well as to deepen the draft so that it is possible to receive larger vessels," he explains.

Furthermore, the technical director of Cecafé also points out the need to invest in highways, railways and waterways to stimulate the diversification of modes. “This will enable a more dynamic turnover of cargo in the ports, so that this set of initiatives allows for better flow of Brazilian harvests, especially containerized ones,” he explains.

Delays in October

According to the Detention Zero Bulletin (DTZ), prepared by the startup ElloX Digital in partnership with Cecafé, 69% of ships, or 218 out of a total of 317 container ships, had delays or changes in scales to export coffee, in the main ports of Brazil, in October of this year.

The longest waiting period last month was 58 days, recorded at the largest port in the Southern Hemisphere, in Santos (SP). In addition, 23 ships did not even have their gates opened, which contributed to the non-shipment of 1,7 million bags (5.203 containers) and the millions in losses for exporters.

Heron recalls that, despite this critical scenario in national port logistics, Brazil has recorded successive records in product exports this year thanks to the commitment of exporters' logistics teams in the search for shipping alternatives and the efforts that port terminals have made to meet the demands of the coffee export trade.

“In October, Brazil exported the largest monthly volume of coffee in history, with 4,926 million bags sent abroad. This record, however, is not due to a favorable scenario in the country's ports, but rather to the herculean work of our associates' logistics teams, who have been seeking other ways to ship, such as the exports of five vessels via break bulk made up until last month, in addition to the efforts of the port terminals to serve us”, he highlights.

According to data from the DTZ Bulletin, in October, the Port of Santos, still the main terminal for exporting Brazilian coffee abroad, with a 67,4% share, recorded a rate of 74% of delays or changes in ship schedules, which involved 125 of the total 169 vessels.

Last month, only 10% of boarding procedures took more than four days for ships to open their gates at the Santos pier. Another 46% took between three and four days and 44% took less than two days.

The port complex in Rio de Janeiro (RJ), the second largest exporter of Brazilian coffee with a 28,1% share of shipments, had a delay rate of 70% last month, with the longest delay being 35 days between the first and last deadline. This percentage means that 46 of the 66 vessels destined for shipments of the product had their ports of call changed.

Still in October of this year, 20% of export procedures took more than four days for the gate to be opened by container ships in Rio de Janeiro ports; 27% took between three and four days; and 53% took less than two days.

In an attempt to mitigate the scenario of logistical bottlenecks that have been impacting the performance of Brazil's export trade, the technical director of Cecafé reinforces that the Council and other agribusiness entities are mobilizing, jointly, to raise awareness and hold public authorities accountable.

“The objective is to present, with concrete data, the impacts of the lack of infrastructure on the country's agricultural exports, so that investments can be increased and the planning and execution of improvement projects in Brazilian ports can be accelerated,” concludes Heron.