Dubai Multi Commodities Center (DMCC), the biggest industry free zone in the emirate, said here Sunday in an emailed statement the development of a 7,500 square meters DMCC Coffee Centre, close to Jebel Ali Port harbour, is underway marked by a ground-breaking ceremony attended by China's Mega Capital Halal (MCH) and Yunnan State Farms Group.

The DMCC Coffee Centre, a temperature-controlled facility, "will offer world-class infrastructure and services for storage, processing, warehousing and delivery of coffee to precise specifications," said DMCC.

The Centre is projected to handle up to 20,000 tonnes of green coffee bean annually, with an estimated trade value of up to 100 million U.S. dollars annually. The center will be completed by 2018, said the free zone.

DMCC, home of over 14,000 registered companies, quoted a report recently released by the International Coffee Organization which said that global exports in coffee year 2016/17 increased by 4.8 percent to 122.45 million bags compared to 116.89 million bags in the previous year.

The UAE is located at the centre of a region which now accounts for eight percent of the trade, or 6.5 billion U.S. dollars of the 85 billion U.S. dollars global consumer spending on coffee.

Email: gaohan@nbd.com.cn