San Jose, Costa Rica, Nov 17 - Nicaragua will produce 21.4 percent less coffee for export in the 2008/09 growing season compared with the previous cycle, the head of the country's exporters association said on Saturday.
Nicaragua sees the 2008/09 coffee harvest, which began this month, at about 1.3 million 60-kg (132-pound) bags, coffee exporter Jose Angel Buitrago told Reuters at an annual coffee conference in Costa Rica.
Nicaragua closed its 2007/08 coffee cycle in September with about 1.6 million 60-kg bags of exports, a 37.1 percent jump from the 2006/07 season.
Buitrago said the biennial nature of the crop, where coffee trees tend to produce less after a boom year, would account for the predicted drop in the 2008/09 production.
In addition to the smaller crop, Nicaraguan farmers are worried about falling coffee prices since much of their crop for the upcoming season remains unsold.
"The situation is very, very difficult. Prices are below production costs," Buitrago said.
Coffee prices fell last month to their lowest levels in more than a year, as investors worried by the global financial crisis pulled money out of commodities futures.
Nicaragua's coffee export board said on Saturday that coffee exports from the Central American country rose 32.7 percent in October, the first month of the growing season, to 101,180 60-kg bags.
The board said exports were 76,271 bags in October 2007.