Starbucks to Source Coffee from China

全球最大咖啡连锁店星巴克（Starbucks）高级副总裁兼大中华区总裁王金龙昨表示，因中国经济地位日趋重要，星巴克大中华区的门店数量将因此倍增至1,000家。

内地咖啡销售年增25%

　　路透社引述王金龙表示，星巴克大中华区目前约有540家门店，随着中国在世界发挥着愈来愈重要的作用，门店数目在未来将增至1,000家，当中除了中国内地外，也包括台湾及香港等地区。

　　虽然，王金龙未有提出达到1,000家门店目标的具体时间表，但他认为目前星巴克正致力于扩展中国市场，其销售增长率亦高于其他地区，此举可以为实现目标创造有利条件。

　　另外，他表示目前中国咖啡消费行业销售，正以每年20%至25%速度增长；星巴克在中国的销售增长率则高于这个水平。

计划向云南购买咖啡豆

　　关于在中国的产品采购问题，王金龙称，星巴克除已选择蒙牛乳业（2319）作为其牛奶供应商之外，亦有计划从中国云南地区购买咖啡豆。

　　星巴克在1998年进入台湾、99年进驻北京，在短短几年间，星巴克已成为内地咖啡行业的第一品牌；以内地为例，分店遍布于北京、天津、上海及南京等各大城市。此外，对内地消费者来说，星巴克不止是咖啡饮品，更是一个品牌和一种文化。

Starbucks Corp, the world's biggest coffee-shop chain, said it planned to source coffee from China for the first time as it expands in a country with more than 5,000 years of tea-drinking culture.

Starbucks has been working with coffee farmers in China's southwestern Yunnan province to help them meet sourcing standards and has sent coffee shipments to the United States for testing, Starbucks China President Wang Jinlong said at the Reuters China Century Summit on Tuesday.

"China does produce some quality coffee," Wang said at the summit, held at the Reuters office in Shanghai.

He added that sourcing from China would start "very soon, maybe in a couple of years".

Starbucks also plans to build a roasting plant in China, where its sales are outpacing market growth, Wang said, adding that China's coffee consumption is increasing 20 to 25 percent each year.

He reiterated that Seattle-based Starbucks aimed to more than triple its global outlets to 40,000 and expected China to become its biggest overseas market.