(Adds details, comments from executive in paragraphs 8-10)

By Peter Frontini

SAO PAULO, Jan 15 (Reuters) - Brazil's green coffee exports ended 2023 nearly flat from the previous year, as vigorous growth in shipments of the robusta variety and China's increasing appetite for the beverage partially offset logistical hurdles, exporters association Cecafe said on Monday.

Farmers exported a total of 35.53 million 60-kg bags of green coffee last year, 0.3% below the figure from 2022, Cecafe said.

Despite the slight drop, the performance of shipments in 2023 was still positive, Cecafe head Marcio Ferreira said in a statement, given that the year was marked by difficulties in logistics such as changes in ship schedules in Brazil's main ports.

"Without these logistical issues, we probably would have exported up to 2 million more bags," Ferreira said.

The year also saw exports of the robusta variety more than triple from 2022 to 4.71 million bags.

China's purchases of Brazilian coffee more than tripled as well in 2023 to 1.48 million bags, making the Asian giant Brazil's No. 6 coffee buyer, compared to 20th place the previous year.

Chinese coffee consumption has been growing rapidly, with the number of branded shops recently surpassing the number of coffee stores in the United States.

Demand from China could improve even further, according to Cecafe. Along with the Brazilian embassy in Beijing, the group is studying ways to supply coffee beans to China's Luckin Coffee.

Cecafe is designing ways to make it possible to have permanent product lines of Brazilian coffee in all of Luckin's coffee shops in China, Cecafe general director Marcos Matos said at a press conference.

The United States remained the largest buyer of Brazil's coffee, even as shipments to the country fell 24.2% in 2023 to 6.07 million bags.

Brazilian farmers shipped 3.78 million bags of green coffee in December, up 30.6% compared to a year earlier.

Shipments of the arabica variety grew 14.8% to 3.26 million bags in the month, while exports of robusta coffee landed at 526,974 bags, a jump of 750.1% from a year earlier.

(Reporting by Peter Frontini; Editing by Kylie Madry and Mark Porter)