What is an ETA in coffee shipping?

The ETA - Estimated Time of Arrival - is the importer or freight forwarder's best prediction of when your shipment will reach the destination port or warehouse. It's based on the vessel's departure date and scheduled route, not a guarantee.

Ocean freight is regularly disrupted - port congestion, vessel delays, bad weather, missed connections at transhipment hubs. An ETA showing Week 12 might quietly become Week 14 with little warning. Shipping disruption through the Suez Canal in recent years pushed many European-bound containers via the Cape of Good Hope, adding weeks to journeys that were previously predictable.

For roasters planning green coffee intake around production schedules, building a week or two of buffer into your planning is standard practice. Treat an ETA as the earliest realistic date, not a confirmed arrival.