Coffee Exports Up 41%

Costa Rican coffee exports in December, the third month of the new 2008-09 crop cycle, rose 41% to 88,966 bags of 60 kilograms each, the official Costa Rican Coffee Institute, or Icafe, said Monday.

This compares to Costa Rican exports of 63,316 bags in December 2007 during the 2007-08 crop cycle (October-September), an Icafe said, citing first preliminary figures for the month.

Total Costa Rican coffee exports in the first three months of the 2008-09 crop cycle from Oct. 1 through Dec. 31, meanwhile, were up 25% to 204,663 bags from exports of 163,337 bags in the October-December period of the 2007-08 year.

Physical harvesting of Costa Rica's 2008-09 harvest is now underway across most of the country's producing regions and is expected to start in earnest this month in most of the country's key producing high-altitude areas.

Coffee from the new crop normally doesn't start reaching the market until December and exports shipped in the first few months of the new cycle traditionally consist almost exclusively of previous-crop beans.

Inside Costa Rica