The UK’s coffee market has been steadily expanding with an increasing number of imports, International Coffee Organization’s latest figures reveal.  “Britain is moving from nation of tea drinkers to what now is becoming a nation of coffee drinkers,” – said Jeffrey Young, managing director of Allegra Strategies. The UK coffee-shop business is booming with about 2 billion coffees drunk in the UK out of home each year from more than 18,000 outlets. The number of shops is set to grow to almost 21,000 by 2020, according to Allegra Strategies, research consultancy. Britain’s growing passion for coffee means constantly increasing demand for coffee import, which is eventually expected to lead to the expansion of the industry by at least 6% a year. However, Jeffrey Young is skeptical about Trading Economics forecast: “That contradicts a lot of data that we have collected. Their forecast might be true in the short-term but our predictions are that in the long-term prices will increase in specialty coffee.” He points the fundamental shortage of coffee to be one of the major reasons for future trading price hike. “The long-term dynamics …