Blog

Brazil’s electricity market is the largest in Latin America and plays a vital role in the domestic economy. Around 3% of Brazil’s GDP is represented by the electricity market, and it is unique in being one of the greenest electricity markets in the world. As we move into the energy sector in Brazil, we want […]

In our recent blog on food packaging and pollution we explored the materials that form the majority of food packaging products and evaluated their pollutive impact on the planet. It became clear that this issue is complicated and far from the good/bad binary that is often used to simplify discussions around packaging’s impact. As awareness […]

Recent years have seen changes to the policies of many leading businesses in many sectors, not least those involved in global trade. As our understanding of the threat of climate change becomes greater there is a drive from consumers to make sustainable change. This has led many industry leaders in the food and beverage, packaging […]

This week is National Coding Week , which aims to build people’s confidence in their digital skills through fun events. As the world continues to embrace new technology, coding has become a priority skill for many organisations looking to innovate. At Czarnikow we have been working with software development company Spyrosoft for the past 3 […]

There is now a worldwide awareness of the challenges facing the environment if we continue living as we are, and an increasing demand for lasting, positive change. This has been felt strongly in the world of packaging, where brands are working on environmentally friendly solutions at rapid speed. As we move into the world of […]

Brazil is the second-largest producer of ethanol, after the USA, with an output of 35 billion litres in 2019. Whereas the USA’s ethanol market is reliant on corn production, the Brazilian market depends on and is largely interconnected with sugarcane production and the global sugar market. Before we begin an in-depth discussion of the Brazilian […]

In the world of commercial shipping, there are three main categories of vessel used: container ships, tankers and bulk shipping. Bulk shipping refers to ships carrying traded dry commodities which are carried in ‘loose’ bulk format, and we are going to focus on these for this blog. Sugar, grain, coal, iron ore and other dry […]

2020 has shown us the vulnerability of many of the systems we rely on for basic human needs, including food and beverages. Alongside the clear damage that climate change threatens in years to come, it is now apparent that innovation and change needs to take place in many of our long-held processes. Therefore, it is […]

The supply of fruit and sugar trading has been impacted by the coronavirus pandemic and we have seen usual flows be disrupted. Some crops have been impacted by weather conditions and demand has risen in certain areas. With all of these fluctuations, we decided to create an update blog. Mango Mango supply is currently very […]

Over the past few months our charity partnership with social mobility charity upReach has strengthened as we hosted our first ‘Associates’, which is a term for undergraduate students who are part of upReach’s programme. The fact that all activity was online did not detract from its value and the presence of the Associates in the […]

As we move into a more diverse range of products including packaging, we wanted to take a closer look at the world of plastic. It is a product which has been a major talking point in recent years, and we have learned that we need to use it in a responsible way to ensure our […]

Without Logistics, supply chains would not be able to function. Moving commodities from A to B is the foundation of everything we do at Czarnikow, and we have a dedicated team who manage the movement of goods for our clients. We caught up with Emma Cullen, Manager of Global Logistics, to find out more about […]

One of the challenges that comes with using deriviatives to manage price risk is the requirement to manage and finance margins, which can be done by using broker lines and margin funding. In this article, we take a look at margining in more detail and also how it can be financed. What is Margining? Margins […]

In a recent blog we shared a glossary of commodities trading terms, aiming to de-mystify the many terms that are commonly used in the industry. Some of these benefit from a little more explanation so we decided to dive deeper and share some further blogs with you. What is a letter of credit? Letters of […]

Following on from the previous interview with one of our team’s traders, we thought it would be interesting to hear from the raw sugar trading side of the business. With the current market volatility due to the coronavirus pandemic, we have turned to some of our team members for inside information on trading at Czarnikow, and how […]

Any follower of banking and investing is probably familiar with the concept of cryptocurrency and, in particular, ‘bitcoin’. You may also have come across the phrase ‘blockchain’, but sometimes this is accompanied by little explanation. Blockchain is the technology behind cryptocurrency and due to this association it may, at first, seem difficult to understand. Despite […]

At Czarnikow, we are proud to work with charities in order to build a fairer future. To date, our charity partners (Teach A Man To Fish and Bhubesi Pride) transform the lives of communities in Africa, The Americas and Asia, using education and sport to build opportunity. Our most recent partnership with upReach, also focuses […]

With the current market volatility due to the coronavirus pandemic, we thought it would be interesting to hear from our team members for some inside information ontrading at Czarnikow, and how the trading team have been impacted. We asked Christopher Morrow, who works on the EU trading desk, some questions about the practical challenges of […]

This year we have published our longest ever annual review, once again focusing on transparent reporting and the building of trust between stakeholders, clients and employees. As such, our business model has been improved this year to reflect not only our core group of clients according to their function and our activities along our supply […]

In March this year, which now seems a lifetime ago, we predicted that due to the coronavirus sugar consumption was likely to fall. We reduced our consumption estimate for 2020 by 2m tonnes, meaning sugar consumption per capita would fall. Two months on, we have further reduced our estimates and can now be fairly certain […]