Dry weather may dent Brazil coffee output

Coffee plantations in the main growing region of Brazil, the world's biggest producer and exporter of the beans, will face predominantly dry weather for the next two weeks, forecaster Climatempo said.

The south of Minas Gerais state, which accounts for about half of Brazil's coffee output, likely won't receive rain in the next 10 days and may get less than 15 millimeters (0.6 inch) from September 24 to 28, Climatempo said. The lack of rain follows a dry spell in August.

"Rains will not be significant in the region,'' Sao Paulo- based Climatempo said on its Web site. "An intensely dry air mass will predominate and hinder the formation of loaded clouds.''

Coffee trees in Minas Gerais and Sao Paulo states, which account for 80 per cent of Brazil's arabica coffee output, need more rain after a dry August, when some trees began flowering sooner than usual, the University of Sao Paulo's agricultural commodities research unit said in a report on September 11.

Brazil's coffee growers will harvest 32.6 million bags of the beans in the current season ending October, down from 42.5 million a year earlier, the government said last month. Production will drop after trees entered the slower half of a two-year cycle and drought hurt flowering last year. A bag of coffee weighs 60 kilograms (132 pounds).

Coffee futures for December delivery rose 1.6 cents, or 1.3 per cent, to $1.1209 a pound on the New York Board of Trade. The most-active contract is up 17 per cent in the past year.