Cafea Fortuna, the most important Romanian company on the coffee market, says coffee imports in Romania have dropped by 15% in the past two years. The producer expects to see a slight turnover increase in 2008 from 2007, to 22-23m euros. In 2007, the company's sales were flat from 2006, at 21.7m euros. " (...)We don't know the real decline because the biggest problem we're coping with is coffee smuggling at the western border of the country. This is why the weight of western regions in our overall sales is low," states Dan Lazarescu, general manager of Cafea Fortuna. Lazarescu puts the domestic coffee market at 37,000 tonnes in 2008, on the volume of imports. As Romania does not have domestic coffee production, imports are a relevant indicator of domestic consumption. In 2007, the firm finalised an 8m-euro investment in a plant at the exit way from Bucharest. Production was thus relocated to a new facility, allowing the company to double its coffee processing capacities. The project was financed from the company's own funds. Lazarescu says he has seen no sales drop, but a slight increase from the first nine or ten months of 2007. "Sales growth can be boosted by our starting exports to Western markets, which we'll seriously consider in 2011 (...)," says Lazarescu.
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