Honduras | History of Honduran Coffee the market for Honduran coffee

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History and Market of Honduras

Coffee is thought to have come to Honduras through merchants at the end of the 18th century. A census in the early 19th century showed that coffee was mainly grown by small farmers and had been widely grown since the mid-20th century.

The coffee industry experienced steady growth since 1980, until 1998, when the United States lost 80% of its agriculture due to Hurricane Mitch. Even after recovering from the natural disaster, most of the economic benefits of coffee were lost by farmers smuggling coffee to Guatemala, where they received higher prices.

IHCAFE, the Honduran Coffee Council, founded in 2000, launched several initiatives (including the Excellence Cup) to help Honduras become a producer of high-quality coffee. Another IHCAFE initiative is to organize coffee growers into six different coffee growing areas to adapt to specific coffee varieties. Therefore, each region specializes in growing coffee of unique quality, and one of its main benefits is that each region can cater to different markets.

In 2009, Honduras experienced record food production and international food prices. In addition, the good marketing of IHCAFE, the coffee council of Honduras, even helped the government out of bankruptcy, and there was a political coup in the same year. In 2011, the country became the largest coffee producer in Central America and in 2012 it became the second largest exporter of Arabica coffee (the largest exporter was Colombia). Despite the increasing challenges posed by climate change, production and quality are improving in Honduras.