Coffee Officials Meet to Discuss Quality Plan
Coffee authorities from Central America, Colombia and Mexico are set to meet in San Jose, Costa Rica, on Tuesday for high-level meetings to monitor the progress of a regional plan to cut low-quality beans from exports and boost flagging prices.
At a meeting in Mexico City in September, the countries put final touches on the plan to cut 5% of poor-quality beans from export inventories beginning Oct. 1, when the 2001-02 harvest began.
This week’s meeting will be held during Costa Rica’s International Coffee Week convention, known as Sintercafe, and will evaluate what each of the nations has done to fulfill September agreements, Sintercafe spokesman and Costa Rica Specialty Coffee Assn. Vice President Arnoldo Leiva said.
The quality plan, spearheaded by Mexico, represents a regional effort to improve the quality of the region’s beans amid a global coffee crisis that has seen producers unable to care for their crops as prices have fallen to historic lows during the last two years.
The plan also aims to boost the price of beans.
Start your day right
Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
