Meteorologists were not available to comment on the short-term weather outlook for the central highlands, where most of Vietnam's robusta is grown.

"The rains have slowed down bean pick-up. Every afternoon this week it has rained and farmers are afraid of high moisture in beans so they are leaving them on the trees," said a dealer in the top coffee province of Daklak. Many Vietnam plantations dry beans outdoors, and high moisture levels become a problem if picked beans get wet. Vietnam's robusta grade two, five percent black and broken was quoted at $970-980 a tonne, FOB Saigon Port on Thursday, and one trader said offers were $940-960 a tonne on Friday. There were no quotes for lower grade eight percent black and broken. Last week, prices ranged between $940-980 a tonne. London January ended at $1,250 a tonne on Thursday and traders said the common discount applied for Vietnam's robusta had been between $270-280 a tonne. A coffee trader from southern Dong Nai province said harvesting of the 1999/2000 coffee crop was not expected to peak there until later in November. Overall harvesting across the key provinces normally lasts until January.

"The beans are bigger (than last year) which is good, but so far, the market is cautious about the weather and so we are seeing very few deals," he said.

Coffee speculators would dare not stock up on beans because of the uncertain situation, traders added. Last week a meteorologist in Daklak's capital of Buon Ma Thuot said showers could linger until mid-November. Vietnam, one of the world's top robusta exporters, is expected to produce bumper yields of 400,000-450,000 tonnes for the 1999/2000 season compared with 95,000 tonnes last crop. It exported 319,000 tonnes of robusta in the first 10 months of the year, up 9.2 percent from the same period in 1998, official statistics show.