Domination of transnational corporations in the coffee industry

Growing concentration in the ownership of the processing and distribution industry is a result of major coffee firms' strategy to merge with and/or acquire their rivals in order to increase their market shares. This strategy aims primarily to either facilitate entry to a national market or to reduce the number of rivals in an established national market. Besides, they use product differentiation, price discrimination and technology control. These strategies of leading transnational corporations in the coffee industry are constraints on the independent entry of other coffee producers (particularly the small ones) into major consumer country markets and on the increase of their share of coffee value added.