Coffee exports decrease by 17% in seven months

Ecuadonews:

At present, it is estimated that the country produces about 280,000 quintals of coffee of the Arabian and Robusta varieties. Ashley Delgado, president of the National Association of Coffee Exporters (Anecafé), commented that this figure is small compared to previous years.

“We estimate that the harvest of 2016 could have been the one of smaller production in the history of the Ecuadorian coffee“. Vinicio Dávila, director of the ‘Golden Cup 2017’ contest, said that the causes are a decline in production, the age of plants, the presence of pests, among others.

To cover the needs of the coffee industry, the country has to import about 750,000 bags of the grain from Vietnam, Indonesia, and Central America. The product comes to be processed, industrialized and thus re-exported. However, Ecuadorian coffee exports declined by 17% in the first seven months of the year compared to the same period in 2016.

“The objective of the private company, Anecafé, and the Government is that in a few years we will produce more than two million bags of coffee we produced 23 years ago and we no longer have the need to import the product,” said Dávila.(I)

Source: http://www.eltelegrafo.com.ec/noticias/economia/8/las-exportaciones-de-cafe-bajan-17-en-siete-meses