Central America and Mexico 2013/14 coffee output is expected to plunge as a severe outbreak of roya, or leaf rust, cuts production, an executive at the International Coffee Organisation (ICO) told Reuters on Wednesday. Ricardo Villanueva, president of the ICO's private sector consultative board and previously president of Guatemala's coffee growers association Anacaf, estimated 2013/14 output in the region would fall by between 5 million and 7 million 60-kg bags.
For 2012/13, the ICO forecast Central America and Mexico output at 19.7 million bags in its December report. Aggressive outbreaks of the blight known as roya have hit Central America's major coffee-producing nations and Mexico, which are home to more than a fifth of the world's arabica coffee production.
Villanueva said Guatemala's production could fall by around a quarter, or between 800,000 bags and 1 million bags, on the year. Guatemala is the region's second biggest coffee exporter behind Honduras. "The damage is so strong, the roya is so resistant to the agro chemicals that we use, that we cannot fix it for the next 2 to 3 years," he said.
"The only way to solve it is to plant new seeds." Roughly 70 percent of Guatemala's 276,000 hectares of seeded coffee land have been hit by the fungus, which attacks coffee leaves, causing the weakened plant to produce less. Compounding the problem for farmers, coffee prices have fallen by about half since a mid-2011 peak. Anticipation of another large crop from top coffee producer Brazil sent ICE arabica coffee futures to a 32-month low of $1.3760 per lb on February 19. Villanueva said that the two main tree varieties in Guatemala have no resistance to the disease.
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