A report received today from a Vietnamese Co., confirms that by now Vietnam holds around 50 - 60K tons stocks and most of it in the hands of wealthy farmers, textually "For examples we saw one cashew trader keep 2000 mt pepper, some keep 1,500 mt, 300 mt, 200 mt lots...", waiting for prices to rise further.
Actually, according to the report, the shortage of black pepper started due to interest of farmers to make white pepper for China which took 10,000 mt in the first 4 month of this year compared to 12,000 mt during the whole 2009. This is confirmed at certain point by the amricon report which mention "...With a least 50% of the crop harvested and sold, sales pressure we think ,will not be forthcoming from Vietnam. Buyers are looking at Indonesia to figure out what they will do and hope to see some pressure which is not happening at this stage."

Tne important issue that should be considered is that in July the Ramadan demande will cease, bringing some lazy time for pepper trade until September.

PEPPERTRADE EDITOR