U.S. coffee chain Starbucks signed a memorandum of understating (MOU) Friday with authorities in southwest China's Yunnan Province to set up a coffee production base.
According to the MOU signed with the Yunnan Academy of Agricultural Sciences and the Pu'er municipal government, Starbucks will invest in a coffee-planting base, a coffee research center, a coffee-planter support center and a coffee processing factory in Yunnan.
The specific cooperation plan will be worked out in January 2011, said Yang Yalin, vice mayor of Pu'er City.
Starbucks is increasingly buying Yunnan-grown coffee beans, with the purchased amount increasing 20 times since 2007, said Wang Jinlong, chairman of the board of Starbucks Greater China. "Demand in the future will climb."
To enhance the development of coffee industry, the Yunnan provincial government will invest three billion yuan (about 455 million U.S. dollars) to boost the annual output of coffee beans in the province to 200,000 tonnes from the current 38,000 tonnes by 2020.
The move will improve the industrial supply chain of Starbucks in China and reinforce Starbucks' leading position in China, said Howard Shultz, Starbucks' chairman and chief executive officer.
Starbucks opened its first coffee bar on the Chinese mainland in Beijing in 1999 and opened its 400th in central China's Hunan Province in September. The company also has about 400 coffee bars in Macao, Taiwan and Hong Kong.
According to the MOU signed with the Yunnan Academy of Agricultural Sciences and the Pu'er municipal government, Starbucks will invest in a coffee-planting base, a coffee research center, a coffee-planter support center and a coffee processing factory in Yunnan.
The specific cooperation plan will be worked out in January 2011, said Yang Yalin, vice mayor of Pu'er City.
Starbucks is increasingly buying Yunnan-grown coffee beans, with the purchased amount increasing 20 times since 2007, said Wang Jinlong, chairman of the board of Starbucks Greater China. "Demand in the future will climb."
To enhance the development of coffee industry, the Yunnan provincial government will invest three billion yuan (about 455 million U.S. dollars) to boost the annual output of coffee beans in the province to 200,000 tonnes from the current 38,000 tonnes by 2020.
The move will improve the industrial supply chain of Starbucks in China and reinforce Starbucks' leading position in China, said Howard Shultz, Starbucks' chairman and chief executive officer.
Starbucks opened its first coffee bar on the Chinese mainland in Beijing in 1999 and opened its 400th in central China's Hunan Province in September. The company also has about 400 coffee bars in Macao, Taiwan and Hong Kong.
