Indonesians, on the other hand, are shadowing their competitor less actively, amid political and economic uncertainties in the run-up to June 7 elections, they said.

"Vietnamese sold a reasonable amount recently, but they've got still quite a lot to go," said a senior trader. "Indonesians are not so aggressive at the moment. They are following the situation at par with Vietnam," he added.

Traders said Vietnamese robusta grade two, 5 per cent black and broken was $240/$250 a tonne FOB under prices in London, where the July shed $21 to $1,482 in quiet trade on Monday.

Indonesian grade-four robusta beans were seen at similar levels. Before the latest retreat, the LIFFE July contract rallied to $1,594 last week on talk of cool temperatures in Brazil, after starting theweek at just above $1,400.

The market is expected to remain jumpy as Brazil nears its frost season in June. Traders said the Vietnamese, who have looked for an opportunity to unload stocks estimated at 80,000-100,000 tonnes from the previous harvest, have sold a few containers since late last week. Traders said there are still more than 50,000 tonnes to sell before the next harvest in October.

Official data showed last week that Vietnam exported 182,000 tonnes of coffee during the first five months of this year, up 4.6 per cent from the same period in 1998.

Vietnam has an export target of 380,000 tonnes in calendar 1999.

With the election campaign ongoing and eyes on any rupiah volatility, Indonesian suppliers were subdued despite the ongoing harvest that is expected to peak in June, traders said.

The rupiah climbed back against the dollar to 7,978/7,998 by 0740 GMT after retreating to above 8,100 over the weekend.

Many Indonesia exporters were on the sidelines or had leftthe country entirely amidconcerns about the outbreak of violence with the elections.

On Tuesday, several people were injured in a fight betweenrival political supporters in Sumatra's main city of Medan.

"It's very difficult to do anything there aggressively atthe moment," said another trader. "With elections going on, people are conservative in doing business. Exporters are holding back."

Traders here were sceptical of talks in Indonesia that theJakarta government might announce new export taxes of between 10 and 30 percent on commodities, including coffee.

"I don't think they're going to do so ahead of theelections," said a third trader. "But they have to do something as tax collection is down. "

The first trader added: "Why would they want to put tax oncoffee? It's silly. There's a lot of coffee in the world."