Ogden Daily Standard | 1919-08-12 | Page 2 | Coffee Crop Short and Prices Cannot be Kept Down

COFFEE CROP SHORT III PRICES CUT BE KEPT 001 SAN FRANCISCO, Aug 7 Amer! can importers and domestic roasters land handlers of coffee are powerless :ln stop the rise in the price of roffee, according to a statement issued here today by Ihe Pacific Coast Coffee I Roasters' association. The statement 1 declare! that circumstances cir-cumstances over which American dealers deal-ers have no ctnorol have forced coffee cof-fee prices to their present high level. The advanCe is attributed principally to the shoriage in this year's Brazilian Brazil-ian coffee crop which, owing to th severe f rost of July 1918, will be cut to one-half its normal size. This de Dieted crp began coming on the mar-ket mar-ket about July 1 this year and. acco'.; ing to the roasters, will largel hnv to supplv the Deeds of this rnimtr ' and Europe for the next twelve J months Last year's frost, the worse experienced exper-ienced in more than a quarter of a century, cen-tury, out ot a total of 800,000,000 trees 'in the Sao Paulo district, the world greatest coffee producing section or Brazil, killed 160,000,000 young treee I More than 300.000.00ti mature treed were so badly damaged they had to be I cut down to the roots. Even under i favorable conditions these trees cannot can-not be made to yield a crop for thn j years. On top of the short crop, the Euro-pean Euro-pean demand for coffee has been enormous enor-mous since the signing of the a rail tiec and. with practically the entite, surplus of coffee stocks from formei years used up during the war. there lis not enough coffee in sight to meel i the demand which is being niado by' i the entire w orld. The coffee roasters' statement in (conclusion says: I "It Is misleading and unfair to blame J the coffee importers of this counl ) for conditions over which they have I no control and vhlch are een more unwelcome to them than they are to I the consumer. Any importer, jobber coffee roaster or retail grocer' will tell you that the high price is seriously Interfering In-terfering with his business II is o Well-known principle ih.it it s hanl r to make profit on a high market than on a low one."