CupScout

_The early days of coffee culture in Abyssinia and Arabia–Coffee
cultivation in general–Soil, climate, rainfall, altitude,
propagation, preparing the plantation, shade and wind breaks,
fertilizing, pruning, catch crops, pests, and diseases–How coffee
is grown around the world–Cultivation in all the principal
producing countries_

For the beginnings of coffee culture we must go back to the Arabian
colony of Harar in Abyssinia, for here it was, about the fifteenth
century, that the Arabs, having found the plant growing wild in the
Abyssinian highlands, first gave it intensive cultivation. The complete
story of the early cultivation of coffee in the old and new worlds is
told in chapter II, which deals with the history of the propagation of
the coffee plant.

La Roque[314] was the first to tell how the plant was cultivated and the
berries prepared for market in Arabia, where it was brought from
Abyssinia.

The Arabs raised it from seed grown in nurseries, transplanting it to
plantations laid out in the foot-hills of the mountains, to which they
conducted the mountain streams by ingeniously constructed small channels
to water the roots. They built trenches three feet wide and five feet
deep, lining them with pebbles to cause the water to sink deep into the
earth with which the trenches were filled, to preserve the moisture from
too rapid evaporation. These were so constructed that the water could be
turned off into other channels when the fruit began to ripen. In
plantations exposed to the south, a kind of poplar tree was planted
along the trenches to supply needful shade.

La Roque noted that the coffee trees in Yemen were planted in lines,
like the apple trees in Normandy; and that when they were much exposed
to the sun, the shade poplars were regularly introduced between the
rows.

Such cultivation as the plant received in early Abyssinia and Arabia was
crude and primitive at best. Throughout the intervening centuries, there
has been little improvement in Yemen; but modern cultural methods obtain
in the Harar district in Abyssinia.

Like the Arabs in Yemen, the Harari cultivated in small gardens,
employing the same ingenious system of irrigation from mountain springs
to water the roots of the plants at least once a week during the dry
season. In Yemen and in Abyssinia the ripened berries were sun-dried on
beaten-earth barbecues.

The European planters who carried the cultivation of the bean to the Far
East and to America followed the best Arabian practise, changing, and
sometimes improving it, in order to adapt it to local conditions.

_Coffee Cultivation in General_

Today the commercial growers of coffee on a large scale practise
intensive cultivation methods, giving the same care to preparing their
plantations and maintaining their trees as do other growers of grains
and fruits. As in the more advanced methods of arboriculture, every
effort is made to obtain the maximum production of quality coffee
consistent with the smallest outlay of money and labor. Experimental
stations in various parts of the world are constantly working to improve
methods and products, and to develop types that will resist disease and
adverse climatic conditions.

While cultivation methods in the different producing countries vary in
detail of practise, the principles are unchanging. Where methods do
differ, it is owing principally to local economic conditions, such as
the supply and cost of labor, machinery, fertilizers, and similar
essential factors.

[Illustration: IMPLEMENTS USED IN EARLY ARABIAN COFFEE CULTURE

1, Plow. 2 and 3, Mattocks. 4, Hatchet and sickle. Top, Seeder
Implement]

SOIL. Rocky ground that pulverizes easily–and, if possible, of volcanic
origin–is best for coffee; also, soil rich in decomposed mold. In
Brazil the best soil is known as _terra roxa_, a topsoil of red clay
three or four feet thick with a gravel subsoil.

CLIMATE. The natural habitat of the coffee tree (all species) is
tropical Africa, where the climate is hot and humid, and the soil rich
and moist, yet sufficiently friable to furnish well drained seed beds.
These conditions must be approximated when the tree is grown in other
countries. Because the trees and fruit generally can not withstand
frost, they are restricted to regions where the mean annual temperature
is about 70° F., with an average minimum about 55°, and an average
maximum of about 80°. Where grown in regions subject to more or less
frost, as in the northernmost parts of Brazil’s coffee-producing
district, which lie almost within the south temperate zone, the coffee
trees are sometimes frosted, as was the case in 1918, when about forty
percent of the São Paulo crop and trees suffered.

Generally speaking, the most suitable climate for coffee is a temperate
one within the tropics; however, it has been successfully cultivated
between latitudes 28° north and 38° south.

RAINFALL. Although able to grow satisfactorily only on well drained
land, the coffee tree requires an abundance of water, about seventy
inches of rainfall annually, and must have it supplied evenly throughout
the year. Prolonged droughts are fatal; while, on the other hand, too
great a supply of water tends to develop the wood of the tree at the
expense of the flowers and fruit, especially in low-lying regions.

ALTITUDE. Coffee is found growing in all altitudes, from sea-level up to
the frost-line, which is about 6,000 feet in the tropics. _Robusta_ and
_liberica_ varieties of coffee do best in regions from sea-level up to
3,000 feet, while _arabica_ flourishes better at the higher levels.

Carvalho says that the coffee plant needs sun, but that a few hours
daily exposure is sufficient. Hilly ground has the advantage of offering
the choice of a suitable exposure, as the sun shines on it for only a
part of the day. Whether it is the early morning or the afternoon sun
that enables the plant to attain its optimum conditions is a question of
locality.

[Illustration: CROSS SECTION OF MOUNTAIN SLOPE IN YEMEN, ARABIA, SHOWING
COFFEE TERRACES

These miniature plantations are found chiefly along the caravan route
between Hodeida and Sanaa]

[Illustration: CLEARING VIRGIN FOREST FOR A COFFEE ESTATE IN MEXICO]

[Illustration: COFFEE NURSERY UNDER A BAMBOO ROOF IN COLOMBIA]

[Illustration: THE FIRST STEPS IN COFFEE GROWING]

In Mexico, Romero tells us, the highlands of Soconusco have the
advantage that the sun does not shine on the trees during the whole of
the day. On the higher slopes of the Cordilleras–from 2,500 feet above
sea-level–clouds prevail during the summer season, when the sun is
hottest, and are frequently present in the other seasons, after ten
o’clock in the morning. These keep the trees from being exposed to the
heat of the sun during the whole of the day. Perhaps to this
circumstance is due the superior excellence of certain coffees grown in
Mexico, Colombia, and Sumatra at an altitude of 3,000 feet to 4,000 feet
above sea-level.

Richard Spruce, the botanist, in his notes on South America, as quoted
by Alfred Russel Wallace,[315] refers to “a zone of the equatorial Andes
ranging between 4,000 and 6,000 feet altitude, where the best flavored
coffee is grown.”

PROPAGATION. Coffee trees are grown most generally from seeds selected
from trees of known productivity and longevity; although in some parts
of the world propagation is done from shoots or cuttings. The seed
method is most general, however, the seeds being either propagated in
nursery beds, or planted at once in the spot where the mature tree is to
stand. In the latter case–called planting at stake–four or five seeds
are planted, much as corn is sown; and after germination, all but the
strongest plant are removed.

Where the nursery method is followed, the choicest land of the
plantation is chosen for its site; and the seeds are planted in forcing
beds, sometimes called cold-frames. When the plants are to be
transplanted direct to the plantation, the seeds are generally sown six
inches apart and in rows separated by the same distance, and are covered
with only a slight sprinkling of earth. When the plants are to be
transferred from the first bed to another, and then to the plantation,
the seeds are sown more thickly; and the plants are “pricked” out as
needed, and set out in another forcing bed.

During the six to seven weeks required for the coffee seed to germinate,
the soil must be kept moist and shaded and thoroughly weeded. If the
trees are to be grown without shade, the young plants are gradually
exposed to the sun, to harden them, before they begin their existence in
the plantation proper.

[Illustration: COFFEE TREE NURSERY, PANAJABAL, POCHUTA, GUATEMALA]

[Illustration: DRYING GROUNDS AND FACTORY IN THE PREANGER REGENCY]

[Illustration: NATIVE TRANSPORT, FIELD TO FACTORY, AT DRAMAGA, NEAR
BUITENZORG]

[Illustration: COFFEE SCENES IN JAVA, NETHERLANDS EAST INDIES]

Considerable experimental work has been done in renewing trees by
grafting, notably in Java; but practically all commercial planters
follow the seed method.

[Illustration: COFFEE GROWING UNDER SHADE, PORTO RICO]

PREPARING THE PLANTATION. Before transplanting time has come, the
plantation itself has been made ready to receive the young plants.
Coffee plantations are generally laid out on heavily wooded and sloping
lands, most often in forests on mountainsides and plateaus, where there
is an abundance of water, of which large quantities are used in
cultivating the trees and in preparing the coffee beans for market. The
soil most suitable is friable, sandy, or even gravelly, with an
abundance of rocks to keep the soil comparatively cool and well drained,
as well as to supply a source of food by action of the weather. The
ideal soil is one that contains a large proportion of potassium and
phosphoric acid; and for that reason, the general practise is to burn
off the foliage and trees covering the land and to use the ashes as
fertilizer.

In preparing the soil for the new plantation under the intensive
cultivation method, the surface of the land is lightly plowed, and then
followed up with thorough cultivation. When transplanting time comes,
which is when the plant is about a year old, and stands from twelve to
eighteen inches high with its first pairs of primary branches, the
plants are set out in shallow holes at regular intervals of from eight
to twelve, or even fourteen, feet apart. This gives room for the root
system to develop, provides space for sunlight to reach each tree, and
makes for convenience in cultivating and harvesting. _Liberica_ and
_robusta_ type trees require more room than _arabica._ When set twelve
feet apart, which is the general practise, with the same distance
maintained between rows, there are approximately four hundred and fifty
trees to the acre. In the triangle, or hexagon, system the trees are
planted in the form of an equilateral triangle, each tree being the same
distance (usually eight or nine feet) from its six nearest neighbors.
This system permits of 600 to 800 trees per acre.

SHADE AND WIND BREAKS. Strong, chilly winds and intensely hot sunlight
are foes of coffee trees, especially of the _arabica_ variety.
Accordingly, in most countries it is customary to protect the plantation
with wind-breaks consisting of rugged trees, and to shade the coffee by
growing trees of other kinds between the rows. The shade trees serve
also to check soil erosion; and in the case of the leguminous kinds, to
furnish nutriment to the soil. Coffee does best in shade such as is
afforded by the silk oak (_Grevillea robusta_). In _Shade in Coffee
Culture_ (_Bulletin_ 25, 1901, division of botany, United States
Department of Agriculture), O.F. Cook goes extensively into this
subject.

The methods employed in the care of a coffee plantation do not differ
materially from those followed by advanced orchardists in the colder
fruit-belts of the world. After the young plants have gained their
start, they are cultivated frequently, principally to keep out the
weeds, to destroy pests, and to aerate the earth. The implements used
range from crude hand-plows to horse-drawn cultivators.

FERTILIZING. Comparatively little fertilizing is done on plantations
established on virgin soil until the trees begin to bear, which occurs
when they are about three years of age. Because the coffee tree takes
potash, nitrogen, and phosphoric acid from the soil, the scheme of
fertilizing is to restore these elements. The materials used to replace
the soil-constituents consist of stable manure, leguminous plants,
coffee-tree prunings, leaves, certain weeds, oil cake, bone and fish
meal, guano, wood ashes, coffee pulp and parchment, and such chemical
fertilizers as superphosphate of lime, basic slag, sulphate of ammonia,
nitrate of lime, sulphate of potash, nitrate of potash, and similar
materials.

The relative values of these fertilizers depend largely upon local
climate and soil conditions, the supply, the cost, and other like
factors. The chemical fertilizers are coming into increasing use in the
larger and more economically advanced producing countries. Brazil,
particularly, is showing in late years a tendency toward their adoption
to make up for the dwindling supply of the so-called natural manures. As
the coffee tree grows older, it requires a larger supply of fertilizer.

[Illustration: THE FAMOUS BOEKIT GOMPONG ESTATE, NEAR PADANG, ON
SUMATRA'S WEST COAST

Showing the healthy, regular appearance of well-cultivated coffee
bushes, twenty-six years old. Also note the line of feathery bamboo
wind-breaks]

PRUNING. On the larger plantations, pruning is an important part of the
cultivation processes. If left to their own devices, coffee trees
sometimes grow as high as forty feet, the strength being absorbed by the
wood, with a consequent scanty production of fruit. To prevent this
undesirable result, and to facilitate picking, the trees on the more
modern plantations are pruned down to heights ranging from six to twelve
feet. Except for pruning the roots when transplanting, the tree is
permitted to grow until after producing its first full crop before any
cutting takes place. Then, the branches are severely cut back; and
thereafter, pruning is carried on annually. Topping and pruning begin
between the first and the second years.

[Illustration: COFFEE ESTATE IN ANTIOQUIA, COLOMBIA, SHOWING
WIND-BREAKS]

Coffee trees as a rule produce full crops from the sixth to the
fifteenth year, although some trees have given a paying crop until
twenty or thirty years old. Ordinarily the trees bear from one-half
pound to eight pounds of coffee annually, although there are accounts of
twelve pounds being obtained per tree. Production is mostly governed by
the cultivation given the tree, and by climate, soil, and location. When
too old to bear profitable yields, the trees on commercial plantations
are cut down to the level of the ground; and are renewed by permitting
only the strongest sprout springing out of the stump to mature.

CATCH CROPS. On some plantations it has become the practise to grow
catch crops between the rows of coffee trees, both as a means of
obtaining additional revenue and to shade the young coffee plants. Corn,
beans, cotton, peanuts, and similar plants are most generally used.

PESTS AND DISEASES. The coffee tree, its wood, foliage, and fruit, have
their enemies, chief among which are insects, fungi, rodents (the
“coffee rat”), birds, squirrels, and–according to Rossignon–elephants,
buffalo, and native cattle, which have a special liking for the tender
leaves of the coffee plant. Insects and fungi are the most bothersome
pests on most plantations. Among the insects, the several varieties of
borers are the principal foes, boring into the wood of the trunk and
branches to lay _larvae_ which sap the life from the tree. There are
scale insects whose excretion forms a black mold on the leaves and
affects the nutrition by cutting off the sunlight. Numerous kinds of
beetles, caterpillars, grasshoppers, and crickets attack the coffee-tree
leaves, the so-called “leaf-miner” being especially troublesome. The
Mediterranean fruit fly deposits _larvae_ which destroy or lessen the
worth of the coffee berry by tunneling within and eating the contents of
the parchment. The coffee-berry beetle and its grub also live within the
coffee berry.

Among the most destructive fungoid diseases is the so-called Ceylon leaf
disease, which is caused by the _Hemileia vastatrix_, a fungus related
to the wheat rust. It was this disease which ruined the coffee industry
in Ceylon, where it first appeared in 1869, and since has been found in
other coffee-producing regions of Asia and Africa. America has a similar
disease, caused by the _Sphaerostilbe flavida_, that is equally
destructive if not vigilantly guarded against. (See chapters XV and
XVI.)

The coffee-tree roots also are subject to attack. There is the root
disease, prevalent in all countries, and for which no cause has yet been
definitely assigned, although it has been determined that it is of a
fungoid nature. Brazil, and some other American coffee-producing
countries, have a serious disease caused by the eelworm, and for that
reason called the eelworm disease.

Coffee planters combat pests and diseases principally with sprays, as in
other lines of advanced arboriculture. It is a constant battle,
especially on the large commercial plantations, and constitutes a large
item on the expense sheet.

_Cultivation by Countries_

Coffee-cultivation methods vary somewhat in detail in the different
producing countries. The foregoing description covers the underlying
principles in practise throughout the world; while the following is
intended to show the local variations in vogue in the principal
countries of production, together with brief descriptions of the main
producing districts, the altitudes, character of soil, climate, and
other factors that are peculiar to each country. In general, they are
considered in the order of their relative importance as producing
countries.

BRAZIL. In Brazil, the Giant of South America, and the world’s largest
coffee producer, the methods of cultivation naturally have reached a
high point of development, although the soil and the climate were not at
first regarded as favorable. The year 1723 is generally accepted as the
date of the introduction of the coffee plant into Brazil from French
Guiana. Coffee planting was slow in developing, however, until 1732,
when the governor of the states of Pará and Maranhao urged its
cultivation. Sixteen years later, there were 17,000 trees in Pará. From
that year on, slow but steady progress was made; and by 1770, an export
trade had been begun from the port of Pará to countries in Europe.

[Illustration: UP-TO-DATE WEEDING AND HARROWING, SÃO PAULO]

The spread of the industry began about this time. The coffee tree was
introduced into the state of Rio de Janeiro in 1770. From there its
cultivation was gradually extended into the states of São Paulo, Minãs
Geraes, Bahia, and Espirito Santo, which have become the great
coffee-producing sections of Brazil. The cultivation of the plant did
not become especially noteworthy until the third decade of the
nineteenth century. Large crops were gathered in the season of 1842-43;
and by the middle of the century, the plantations were producing
annually more than 2,000,000 bags.

[Illustration: Photograph by Courtesy of J. Aron & Co.

GENERAL VIEW OF FAZENDA DUMONT, RIBEIRAO PRETO, SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL]

Brazil’s commercial coffee-growing region has an estimated area of
approximately 1,158,000 square miles, and extends from the river Amazon
to the southern border of the state of São Paulo, and from the Atlantic
coast to the western boundary of the state of Matto Grosso. This area is
larger than that section of the United States lying east of the
Mississippi River, with Texas added. In every state of the republic,
from Ceará in the north to Santa Catharina in the south, the coffee tree
can be cultivated profitably; and is, in fact, more or less grown in
every state, if only for domestic use. However, little attention is
given to coffee-growing in the north, except in the state of Pernambuco,
which has only about 1,500,000 trees, as compared, with the 764,000,000
trees of São Paulo in 1922.

The chief coffee-growing plantations in Brazil are situated on plateaus
seldom less than 1,800 feet above sea-level, and ranging up to 4,000
feet. The mean annual temperature is approximately 70° F., ranging from
a mean of 60.8° in winter to a mean of 72° in summer. The temperature
has been known, however, to register 32° in winter and 97.7° in summer.

While coffee trees will grow in almost any part of Brazil, experience
indicates that the two most fertile soils, the _terra roxa_ and the
_massape_, lie in the “coffee belts.” The _terra roxa_ is a dark red
earth, and is practically confined to São Paulo, and to it is due the
predominant coffee productivity of that state. _Massape_ is a yellow,
dark red–or even black–soil, and occurs more or less contiguous to the
_terra roxa_. With a covering of loose sand, it makes excellent coffee
land.

Brazil planters follow the nursery-propagated method of planting, and
cultivate, prune, and spray their trees liberally. Transplanting is done
in the months from November to February.

Coffee-growing profits have shown a decided falling off in Brazil in
recent years. In 1900 it was not uncommon for a coffee estate to yield
an annual profit of from 100 to 250 percent. Ten years later the average
returns did not exceed twelve percent.

[Illustration: FAZENDA GUATAPARA, SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL, WITH 800,000 TREES
IN BEARING]

In Brazil’s coffee belt there are two seasons–the wet, running from
September to March; and the dry, running from April to August. The
coffee trees are in bloom from September to December. The blossoms last
about four days, and are easily beaten off by light winds or rains. If
the rains or winds are violent, the green berries may be similarly
destroyed; so that great damage may be caused by unseasonable rains and
storms.

The harvest usually begins in April or May, and extends well into the
dry season. Even in the picking season, heavy rains and strong
winds–especially the latter–may do considerable damage; for in Brazil
shade trees and wind-breaks are the exception.

Approximately twenty-five percent of the São Paulo plantations are
cultivated by machinery. A type of cultivator very common is similar to
the small corn-plow used in the United States. The Planet Junior,
manufactured by a well known United States agricultural-machinery firm,
is the most popular cultivator. It is drawn by a small mule, with a boy
to lead it, and a man to drive and to guide the plow.

The preponderance of the coffee over other industries in São Paulo is
shown in many ways. A few years ago the registration of laborers in all
industries was about 450,000; and of this total, 420,000 were employed
in the production and transportation of coffee alone. Of the capital
invested in all industries, about eighty-five percent was in coffee
production and commerce, including the railroads that depended upon it
directly. An estimated value of $482,500,000 was placed upon the
plantations in the state, including land, machinery, the residences of
owners, and laborers’ quarters.

[Illustration: Copyright by Brown & Dawson.

PICKING COFFEE IN SÃO PAULO]

In all Brazil, there are approximately 1,200,000,000 coffee trees. The
number of bearing coffee trees in São Paulo alone increased from
735,000,000 in 1914-15 to 834,000,000 in 1917-18. The crop in 1917-18
was 1,615,000,000 pounds, one of the largest on record. In the
agricultural year of 1922-23 there were 764,969,500 coffee trees in
bearing in São Paulo, and in São Paulo, Minãs, and Parana, 824,194,500.

[Illustration: Photograph by Courtesy of J. Aron & Co.

INTENSIVE CULTIVATION METHODS IN THE RIBEIRAO PRETO DISTRICT, SÃO PAULO]

Plantations having from 300,000 to 400,000 trees are common. One
plantation near Ribeirao Preto has 5,000,000 trees, and requires an army
of 6,000 laborers to work it. Another planter owns thirty-two adjacent
plantations containing, in all, from 7,500,000 to 8,000,000 coffee trees
and gives employment to 8,000 persons. There are fifteen plantations
having more than 1,000,000 trees each, and five of these have more than
2,000,000 trees each. In the municipality of Ribeirao Preto there were
30,000,000 trees in 1922.

[Illustration: Photograph by Courtesy of J. Aron & Co.

PRIVATE RAILROAD ON A SÃO PAULO COFFEE FAZENDA

Showing coffee trees and laborers' houses in the middle distance at
right]

The largest coffee plantations in the world are the Fazendas Dumont and
the Fazendas Schmidt. The Fazendas Dumont were valued, in 1915, in cost
of land and improvements, at $5,920,007; and since those figures were
given out, the value of the investment has much increased. Of the
various Fazendas Schmidt, the largest, owned by Colonel Francisco
Schmidt, in 1918 had 9,000,000 trees with an annual yield of 200,000
bags, or 26,400,000 pounds, of coffee. Other large plantations in São
Paulo with a million or more trees, are the Companhia Agricola Fazenda
Dumont, 2,420,000 trees; Companhia São Martinho, 2,300,000 trees;
Companhia Dumont, 2,000,000 trees; São Paulo Coffee Company, 1,860,000
trees; Christiana Oxorio de Oliveira, 1,790,000 trees; Companhia
Guatapara, 1,550,000 trees; Dr. Alfredo Ellis, 1,271,000 trees;
Companhia Agricola Araqua, 1,200,000 trees; Companhia Agricola Ribeirao
Preto, 1,138,000 trees; Rodriguez Alves Irmaos, 1,060,000 trees;
Francisca Silveira do Val, 1,050,000 trees; Luiza de Oliveira Azevedo,
1,045,000 trees; and the Companhia Caféeria São Paulo, 1,000,000 trees.

The average annual yield in São Paulo is estimated at from 1,750 to
4,000 pounds from a thousand trees, while in exceptional instances it is
said that as much as 6,000 pounds per 1,000 trees have been gathered.
Differences in local climatic conditions, in ages of trees, in richness
of soil, and in the care exercised in cultivation, are given as the
reasons for the wide variation.

The oldest coffee-growing district in São Paulo is Campinas. There are
136 others.

Bahia coffee is not so carefully cultivated and harvested as the Santos
coffee. The introduction of capital and modern methods would do much for
Bahia, which has the advantage of a shorter haul to the New York and the
European markets.

On the average, something like seventy percent of the world’s coffee
crop is grown in Brazil, and two-thirds of this is produced in São
Paulo. Coffee culture in many districts of São Paulo has been brought to
the point of highest development; and yet its product is essentially a
quantity, not a quality, one.

COLOMBIA. In Colombia, coffee is the principal crop grown for export. It
is produced in nearly all departments at elevations ranging from 3,500
feet to 6,500 feet. Chief among the coffee-growing departments are
Antioquia (capital, Medellin); Caldas (capital, Manizales); Magdalena
(capital, Santa Marta); Santander (capital, Bucaramanga); Tolima
(capital, Ibague); and the Federal District (capital, Bogota). The
department of Cundinamarca produces a coffee that is counted one of the
best of Colombian grades. The finest grades are grown in the foot-hills
of the Andes, in altitudes from 3,500 to 4,500 feet above sea level.

[Illustration: THE CONDUCTING SLUICEWAY AT GUATAPARA

The running water carries the picked coffee berries to pulpers and
washing tanks]

[Illustration: COFFEE PICKING AND FIELD TRANSPORT]

[Illustration: COFFEE CULTURE IN SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL]

[Illustration: A NEAR VIEW OF A HEAVILY LADEN COFFEE TREE ON A BOGOTA
PLANTATION]

[Illustration: PICKING COFFEE ON A BOGOTA PLANTATION]

Methods of planting, cultivation, gathering, and preparing the Colombian
coffee crop for the market are substantially those that are common in
all coffee-producing countries, although they differ in some small
particulars. About 700 trees are usually planted to the acre, and native
trees furnish the necessary shade. The average yield is one pound per
tree per year.

While _Coffea arabica_ has been mostly cultivated in Colombia, as in the
other countries of South America, the _liberica_ variety has not been
neglected. Seeds of the _liberica_ tree were planted here soon after
1880, and were moderately successful. Since 1900, more attention has
been given to _liberica_, and attempts have been made to grow it upon
banana and rubber plantations, which seem to provide all the shade
protection that is needed. _Liberica_ coffee trees begin to bear in
their third year. From the fifth year, when a crop of about 650 pounds
to the acre can reasonably be expected, the productiveness steadily
increases until after fifteen or sixteen years, when a maximum of over
one thousand pounds an acre is attained.

Antioquia is the largest coffee producing department in the republic,
and its coffee is of the highest grade grown. Medellin, the capital,
where the business interests of the industry are concentrated, is a
handsome white city located on the banks of the Aburra river, in a
picturesque valley that is overlooked by the high peaks of the Andean
range. It is a town of about 80,000 inhabitants, thriving as a
manufacturing center, abundant in modern improvements, and is the center
of a coffee production of 500,000 bags known in the market as Medellin
and Manizales. Another center in this coffee region is the town of
Manizales, perched on the crest of the Andean spurs to dominate the
valley extending to Medellin and the Cauca valley to the Pacific.
There-about many small coffee growers are settled, and several hundred
thousand bags of the beans pass through annually.

One of the interesting plantations of the country was started a few
years ago in a remote region by an enterprising American investor. It
was located on the slopes of the Sierra Nevada mountains 3,000 to 5,000
feet above sea-level, about twenty-five miles from the city of Santa
Marta. An extended acreage of forest-covered land was acquired, about
600 acres of which were cleared and either planted in coffee or reserved
for pasturage and other kinds of agriculture. When the plantation came
to maturity, it had nearly 300,000 trees. In 1919, there were 425,000
trees producing 3,600 hundred-weight of coffee.

A typical Colombian plantation is the Namay, owned by one of the bankers
of the Banco de Colombia of Bogota. It is located a good half day’s
travel by rail and horseback from the city, about 5,000 feet above the
level of the sea. There are 1,000 acres in the plantation, with 250,000
trees having an ultimate productive capacity of nearly 2,000 bags a
year. During crop times, which are from May to July, about two hundred
families are needed on an estate of this size.

VENEZUELA. Seeds of the coffee plant were brought into Venezuela from
Martinique in 1784 by a priest who started a small plantation near
Caracas. Five years later, the first export of the bean was made, 233
bags, or about 30,000 pounds. Within fifty years, production had
increased to upward of 50,000,000 pounds annually; and by the end of the
nineteenth century, to more than 100,000,000 pounds.

Situated between the equator and the twelfth parallel of north latitude,
in the world’s coffee belt, this country has an area equal to that of
all the United States east of the Mississippi river and north of the
Ohio and Potomac rivers, or greater than that of France, Germany, and
the Netherlands combined–599,533 square miles.

The chain of the Maritime Andes, reaching eastward across Colombia and
Venezuela, approaches the Caribbean coast in the latter country. Along
the slopes and foot-hills of these mountains are produced some of the
finest grades of South American coffee. Here the best coffee grows in
the _tierra templada_ and in the lower part of the _tierra fria_, and is
known as the _café de tierra fria_, or coffee of the cold, or high,
land. In these regions the equable climate, the constant and adequate
moisture, the rich and well-drained soil, and the protecting forest
shade afford the conditions under which the plant grows and thrives
best. On the fertile lowland valleys nearer the coast grows the _café de
tierra caliente_, or coffee of the hot land.

[Illustration: ON THE ALTAMIRA HACIENDA, VENEZUELA

The long pipe crossing the center of the picture is a water sluiceway
bringing coffee down from the hills]

Coffee growing has become the main agricultural pursuit of the country.
In 1839 it was estimated that there were 8,900 acres of land planted in
coffee, and in 1888 there were 168,000,000 coffee trees in the country
on 346,000 acres of land. In the opening years of the twentieth century
not far from 250,000 acres were devoted to this cultivation, comprised
in upward of 33,000 plantations. The average yield per acre is about
250 pounds. The trees are usually planted from two to two and a quarter
meters apart, and this gives about 800 trees to the acre. The triangle
system is unknown.

[Illustration: CARMEN HACIENDA, FRONTING ON THE ESCALANTE RIVER,
VENEZUELA]

In this country, the coffee tree bears its first crop when four or five
years old. The trees are not subject to unusual hazards from the attacks
of injurious insects and animals or from serious parasitic diseases.
Nature is kind to them, and their only serious contention for existence
arises from the luxuriant tropical vegetation by which they are
surrounded. On the whole their cultivation is comparatively easy. On the
best managed estates there are not more than 1,000 trees to a
_fanegada_–about one and three-quarters acres of land–and it is
calculated that an average annual yield for such a _fanegada_ should be
about twenty quintals, a little more than 2,032 pounds of merchantable
coffee. It is to be noted, however, that the average yield per tree
throughout Venezuela is low–not more than four ounces.

There are no great coffee belts as in Mexico and Central America. Many
districts are days’ rides apart. The plantations are isolated, and there
is lacking a co-operative spirit among the growers.

Methods of cultivating and preparing the berry for the market are
substantially those that prevail elsewhere in South America. Most
plantations are handled in ordinary, old-fashioned ways; but the better
estates employ machinery and methods of the most advanced and improved
character at all points of their operation, from the planting of the
seed to the final marketing of the berry.

JAVA. Java, the oldest coffee-producing country in which the tree is not
indigenous, was producing a high-grade coffee long before Brazil,
Colombia, and Venezuela entered the industry; and it held its supremacy
in the world’s trade for many years before the younger American
producing countries were able to surpass its annual output. The first
attempt to introduce the plant into Java took place in 1696, the
seedlings being brought from Malabar in India and planted at Kadawoeng,
near Batavia. Earthquake and flood soon destroyed the plants; and in
1699 Henricus Zwaardecroon brought the second lot of seedlings from
Malabar. These became the progenitors of all the _arabica_ coffees of
the Dutch East Indies. The industry grew, and in 1711 the first Java
coffee was sold at public auction in Amsterdam. Exports amounted to
116,587 pounds in 1720; and in 1724 the Amsterdam market sold 1,396,486
pounds of coffee from Java.

From the early part of the nineteenth century up to 1905, cultivation
was carried on under a Dutch government monopoly–excepting for the
five years, 1811-16, when the British had control of the island. The
government monopoly was first established when Marshal Daendels, acting
for the crown of Holland, took control of the islands from the
Netherlands East India Company. Before that time, the princes of
Preanger had raised all the coffee under the provisions of a treaty made
in the middle of the eighteenth century, by which they paid an annual
tribute in coffee to the company for the privilege of retaining their
land revenues. When the Dutch government recovered the islands from the
British, the plantations, which had been permitted to go to ruin, were
put in order again, and the government system re-established.

[Illustration: A HEAVY FRUITING OF COFFEA ROBUSTA IN JAVA]

A modification of the first monopoly plan of the government was put into
effect later in the régime of Governor Van den Bosch, and was maintained
until into the twentieth century. Under the Daendels plan, each native
family was required to keep 1000 coffee trees in bearing on village
lands, and to give to the government two-fifths of the crop, delivered
cleaned and sorted, at the government store. The natives retained the
other three-fifths. Under the Van den Bosch system, each family was
required to raise and care for 650 trees and to deliver the crop cleaned
and sorted to the government stores at a fixed price. The government
then sold the coffee at public auctions in Batavia, Padang, Amsterdam,
or Rotterdam.

This method of fostering the new industry resulted in government control
of fully four-fifths of the area under the crop, only the small balance
being owned or worked independently by private enterprise. For many
years after the cultivation had been fully started, this condition of
the business persisted. Most of the privately-operated plantations had
been in existence before the government had set up its monopoly system.
Others were on the estates of native princes who, in treating with the
Dutch, had been able to retain some of their original sovereign rights.
While these plans worked well in encouraging the industry at the outset,
they were not conducive to the fullest possibilities in production.
Forced labor on the government plantations was naturally apt to be slow,
careless, and indifferent. Private ownership and operation bettered this
somewhat, the private estates being able to show annual yields of from
one to two pounds per tree as compared with only a little more than
one-half pound per tree on government-controlled estates.

In the course of time, the system of private ownership gradually
expanded beyond that of the government; and before the end of the
nineteenth century, private owners were growing and exporting more
coffee than did the Javanese government. The government withdrew from
the coffee business in Java in 1905, and the last government auction was
held in June of that year. The monopoly in Sumatra was given up in 1908.
After that, however, coffee continued to be grown on government lands,
but in much less quantity than in the years immediately preceding. The
Dutch government withdrew from all coffee cultivation in 1918-19.

According to statistics, the ground under cultivation for all kinds of
coffee in Java and the other islands of the Dutch East Indies in 1919
was 142,272 acres, of which 112,138 acres were in Java. Of this area,
110,903 acres were planted with _robusta_, 15,314 acres with _arabica_,
4,940 with _liberica_, and 11,115 with other varieties.

There were more than 400 European-managed estates in 1915, covering a
planted area of about 209,000 acres. Three hundred and thirty of these
estates, representing 165,000 acres, were in Java. On that island
production in 1904 was 47,927,000 pounds; in 1905, 59,092,000 pounds; in
1906, 66,953,000 pounds; in 1907, 31,044,000 pounds; 1908, 39,349,000
pounds. The total crop in 1919 for all the Netherlands East Indies was
97,361,000 pounds, as against 140,764,800 pounds for 1918.

Intensive cultivation methods on the European-operated plantations in
Java have been practised for many years; and the Netherlands East Indies
government has long maintained experimental stations for the purpose of
improving strains and cultivation methods.

[Illustration: ROAD THROUGH A COFFEE ESTATE IN EAST JAVA]

In some parts of the island, especially in the highlands, the climate
and soil are ideal for coffee culture. The _robusta_ tree grows
satisfactorily even at altitudes of less than 1,000 feet in some
regions; but its bearing life is only about ten years, as compared with
the thirty years of the _arabica_ at altitudes of from 3,000 to 4,000
feet. The low-ground trees generally produce earlier and more
abundantly. On some of the highland plantations, pruning is not
practised to any great extent, and the trees often reach thirty or forty
feet in height. This necessitates the use of ladders in picking; but
frequently the yield per tree has been from six to seven pounds.

[Illustration: NATIVE PICKING COFFEE, SUMATRA]

Coffee is produced commercially in nearly every political district in
Java, but the bulk of the yield is obtained from East Java. The names
best known to European and American traders are those of the regencies
of Besoeki and Pasoeroean; because their coffees make up eighty-seven
percent of Java’s production. Some of the other better known districts
are: Preanger, Cheribon, Kadoe, Samarang, Soerabaya, and Tegal.

The _arabica_ variety has practically been driven out of the districts
below 3,500 feet altitude by the leaf disease, and has been succeeded by
the more hardy _robusta_ and _liberica_ coffees and their hybrids.
Illustrating the importance of _robusta_ coffee, Netherlands East India
government in a statement issued August, 1919, estimated the area under
cultivation on all islands as follows: _robusta_, eighty-four percent;
_arabica_, five and one-half percent; _liberica_, four and one-half
percent. The balance, six percent, was made up of scores of other
varieties, among the most important being the _canephora_, _Ugandæ_,
_baukobensis_, _suakurensis_, _Quillou_, _stenophylla_, and
_rood-bessige_. All of these are similar to _robusta_, and are exported
as _robusta-achtigen_ (_robusta_-like). The _liberica_ group includes
the _excelsa_, _abeokuta_, _Dewevrei_, _arnoldiana_, _aruwimiensis_, and
_Dybowskii_.

[Illustration: PALATIAL BUNGALOW OF ADMINISTRATOR, DRAMAGA, IN THE
PREANGER DISTRICT, JAVA]

SUMATRA. Practically all the coffee districts in Sumatra are on the west
coast, where the plant was first propagated early in the eighteenth
century. Padang, the capital city, is the headquarters for Sumatra
coffee. With climate and soil similar to Java, the island of Sumatra has
the added advantage that its land is not “coffee _moe_”, or coffee
tired, as is the case in parts of Java. Some of the world’s best coffees
are still coming from Sumatra; and the island has possibilities that
could make it an important factor in production. Sumatra produced
287,179 piculs of coffee in 1920. The total production of all the
islands that year was 807,591 piculs.

[Illustration: OLD-TIME SAILING VESSEL LOADING IN PADANG ROADS]

[Illustration: INTERIOR OF A DUTCH COFFEE-CLEANING FACTORY, PADANG]

[Illustration: COFFEE SCENES IN SUMATRA, NETHERLANDS EAST INDIES]

[Illustration: ADMINISTRATOR'S BUNGALOW ON THE GADOENG BATOE ESTATE,
SUMATRA]

The districts of Ankola, Siboga, Ayer Bangies, Mandheling, Palembang,
Padang, and Benkoelen, on the west coast, have some of the largest
estates on the island; and their products are well known in
international trade. The east coast has recently gone in for heavy
plantings of _robusta_.

As in Java, coffee for a century or more was cultivated under the
government-monopoly scheme. The compulsory system was given up in this
island in 1908, three years after it was abandoned in Java.

OTHER EAST INDIES. Coffee is grown in several of the other islands in
the Dutch East Indian archipelago, chiefly on the Celebes, Bali, Lombok,
the Moluccas, and Timor. Most of the estates are under native control,
and the methods of cultivation are not up to the standard of the
European-owned plantations on the larger islands of Java and Sumatra.
The most important of these islands is Celebes, where the first coffee
plant was introduced from Java about 1750, but where cultivation was not
carried on to any great extent until about seventy-five years later. In
1822 the production amounted to 10,000 pounds; in 1917, the yield was
1,322,328 pounds.

SALVADOR. Coffee, which is far and away the most important crop in
Salvador, constitutes in value more than one-half the total exports. It
has been cultivated since about 1852, when plants were brought from
Havana; but the development of the industry in its early years was not
rapid. The first large plantations were established in 1876 in La Paz,
and that department has become the leading coffee-producing section of
the country.

The berry is grown in all districts that have altitudes of from 1,500 to
4,000 feet. Besides those of La Paz, the most productive plantations are
in the departments of Santa Ana, Sonsonate, San Salvador, San Vincente,
San Miguel, Santa Tecla, and Ahuachapan. In contrast with several of the
adjoining Central American republics, native Salvadoreans are the owners
of most of the coffee farms, very few having passed into the hands of
foreigners. The laborers are almost entirely native Indians. A
considerable part of the work of cultivating and preparing the berry for
the market is still done by hand; but in recent years machinery has been
set up on the large estates and for general use in the receiving
centers.

[Illustration: WELL CULTIVATED YOUNG COFFEE TREES IN BLOSSOM]

[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO A FINCA IN THE HIGHLANDS]

[Illustration: COFFEE CULTURE IN GUATEMALA]

It is estimated that now about 166,000 acres are under coffee, nearly
all the land in the country suitable for that purpose. As in most other
coffee-raising countries, the trees begin bearing when they are two or
three years old, reach full maturity at the age of seven or eight years,
and continue to bear for about thirty years. Intensive cultivation and a
more extensive use of fertilizers have been urged as necessary in order
to increase the crop; but, so far, with not much effect, the importation
of fertilizer being still very small. Crop gathering begins in the
lowlands in November, and gradually proceeds into the higher regions,
month by month, until the picking in the highest altitudes is finished
in the following March.

GUATEMALA. Guatemala began intensive coffee growing about 1875. Coffee
had been known in the country in a small way from about 1850, but now
serious attention began to be given to its cultivation, and it quickly
advanced to an industrial position of importance. Within a generation it
became the great staple crop of the country.

Guatemala has an area of 48,250 square miles, about the size of the
state of Ohio. Its population is about 2,000,000. Three mountain ranges,
intersecting magnificent table lands, traverse the country from north to
south; and there is the great coffee territory. The table lands are from
2,500 to 5,000 feet above sea-level, and have a temperate climate most
agreeable to the coffee tree. On the lower heights it is necessary to
protect the young trees from the extreme heat of the sun; and the banana
is most approved for this purpose, since it raises its own crop at the
same time that it is giving shade to its companion tree. On the higher
levels the plantations need protection from the cold north winds that
blow strongly across the country, especially in December, January, and
February. The range of hills to the north is the best protection, and
generally is all sufficient. When the weather becomes too severe, heaps
of rubbish mixed with pitch are thrown up to the north of the fields of
coffee trees and set afire, the resultant dense smoke driving down
between rows of trees and saving them from the frost.

[Illustration: INDIANS PICKING COFFEE, GUATEMALA]

Named in the order of their productivity, the coffee districts are Costa
Cuca, Costa Grande, Barberena, Tumbador, Cobán, Costa de Cucho,
Chicacao, Xolhuitz, Pochuta, Malacatan, San Marcos, Chuva, Panan, Turgo,
Escuintla, San Vincente, Pacaya, Antigua, Moran, Amatitlan, Sumatan,
Palmar, Zunil, and Motagua.

Estimates of coffee acreage vary. One authority, too conservatively,
perhaps, puts the figure at 145,000. Another estimate is 260,000 acres.
Under cultivation are from 70,000,000 to 100,000,000 trees from which an
annual crop averaging about 75,000,000 pounds is raised, and the
exceptional amounts of nearly 90,000,000 and 97,000,000 pounds have been
harvested. Several plantations of size can be counted upon for an annual
production of more than 1,000,000 pounds each.

Before the World War German interests dominated the coffee industry,
handling fully eighty percent of the crop, and growing nearly half of
it.

Planting and cultivation methods in Guatemala are about the same as
those prevailing in other countries. The trees are usually in flower in
February, March, and April, and the harvesting season extends from
August to January. All work on the plantation is done by Indian laborers
under a peonage system, families working in companies: wages are small,
but sufficient, conditions of living being easy. As elsewhere in these
tropical and sub-tropical countries, scarcity of labor is severely
felt, and is a grave obstacle to the development of the industry in a
land that is regarded as particularly well adapted to it.

[Illustration: THE COFFEE PLANTER'S LIFE IN GUATEMALA IS ONE OF
PLEASANTNESS AND PEACE]

HAITI. Haiti, the magic isle of the Indies, has grown coffee almost from
the beginning of the introduction of the tree into the western
hemisphere. Its cultivation was started there about 1715, but the trees
were largely permitted to fall into a wild natural state, and little
attention was given to them or to the handling of the crop. Fertility of
soil, climate, and moisture are favorable, and the advancement of the
industry has been retarded only by the political conditions of the negro
republic and a general lack of industry and enterprise on the part of
the people.

Haiti is an island with three names. Haiti is used to describe the
island as a whole, and to denote the Republic of Haiti, which occupies
the western third of its area. The island is also known as Santo
Domingo, and San Domingo, names likewise applied to the Dominican
Republic which occupies the eastern two-thirds of the land unit.

Plantations now existing in Haiti have had, with rare exceptions, a life
of more than ten or twenty years. It is estimated that they cover about
125,000 acres, with about 400 trees to the acre.

When the French acquired the island in 1789, the annual production was
88,360,502 pounds. During the following century that amount was not
approached in any year, the nearest to it being 72,637,716 pounds in
1875. The lowest annual production was 20,280,589 pounds in 1818. The
range during the hundred years, 1789-1890, was, with the exceptions
noted, from 45,000,000 to 71,000,000 pounds.

MEXICO. Opinions differ as to the exact date when coffee was introduced
into Mexico. It is said to have been transplanted there from the West
Indies near the end of the eighteenth century. A story is current that a
Spaniard set out a few trees, on trial, in southern Mexico, in 1800, and
that his experiments started other Mexican planters along the same line.
Coffee was grown in the state of Vera Cruz early in the nineteenth
century; and the books of the Vera Cruz custom house record that 1,101
quintals of coffee were exported through that port during the years
1802, 1803, and 1805.

In the Coatepec district, which eventually became famous in the annals
of Mexican coffee growing, trees were planted about the year 1808. Local
history says that seeds were brought from Cuba by Arias, a partner of
the house of Pedro Lopez, owners of the large _hacienda_ of Orduna in
Coatepec. The seeds were given to a priest, Andres Dominguez, who sowed
them near Teocelo. When he had succeeded in starting seedlings, he gave
them away to other planters there-about. The plants thrived, and this
was the beginning of coffee cultivation in that section of the country.

[Illustration: THIRTY-YEAR-OLD COFFEE TREES, LA ESPERANZA, HUATUSCO,
MEXICO]

It was, however, nearly ten years later before the cultivation was on a
scale approaching industrial and commercial importance. About 1816 or
1818 a Spaniard, named Juan Antonio Gomez, introduced the plant into the
neighborhood of Cordoba. This city, now on the line of the Mexican and
Vera Cruz Railroad, 200 miles from Mexico City, and sixty miles from
Vera Cruz, is 2,500 feet above sea-level, and is situated in the most
productive tropical region of the country.

Having been started in Coatepec and Cordoba, the industry was centered
for a long time in the state of Vera Cruz. For many years practically
all the coffee grown commercially in Mexico was produced in that state.
Gradually the new pursuit spread to the mountains in the adjacent states
of Oaxaca and Puebla, where it was taken up by the Indians almost
entirely, and is still followed by them, but not on a large scale.

Although cultivation is now widely distributed in most of the more
southern states of the republic, the principal coffee territory is still
in Vera Cruz, where lie the districts of Cordoba, Orizaba, Huatusco, and
Coatepec. In the same region are the Jalapa district, and the mountains
of Puebla, where a great deal of coffee is grown. Farther south are the
Oaxaca districts on the mountain slopes of the Pacific coast, and still
farther south the districts of the state of Chiapas. Planting in the
Pluma district in Oaxaca was begun about fifty years ago, and it now
produces annually, in good years, nearly 1,000,000 pounds. The youngest
district in this section is Soconusco, one of the most prolific in the
republic, having been developed within the last thirty years. The region
is near the border of Guatemala, and the coffee is held by many to
possess some of the quality of the coffee of that country. The influence
of Guatemalan methods has been felt also in its cultivation and
handling, especially in increasing plantation productiveness. On the
gulf slope of Oaxaca, there are plantations that annually produce
222,000 to 550,000 pounds. Several United States companies have become
interested in coffee growing in this state, and their output in recent
years has been put upon the market in St. Louis.

Two principal varieties of coffee are recognized in Mexico. A
sub-variety of _Coffea arabica_ is mostly cultivated. This is an
evergreen, growing only from five to seven feet. It flourishes well at
different altitudes and in different climes, from the temperate plains
of Puebla to the hot, damp, lower lands of Vera Cruz and Oaxaca, and
other Pacific-coast regions. The range of elevation for it is from 1,500
to 5,000 feet, and it is satisfied with a temperature as low as 55° or
as high as 80°, with plenty of natural humidity or with irrigation in
the dry season. The other variety is called the “myrtle” and is widely
grown, although not in large quantities. It is distinguished from
_arabica_ by the larger leaf of the tree and by the smaller corolla of
the flower. It is a hardier plant than the _arabica_ and will stand the
higher temperature of low altitudes, thriving at an elevation of from
500 to 3,000 feet above sea-level. Mostly it is cultivated in the
Cordoba district.

It is claimed by many that the Mexican coffee of best quality is grown
in the western regions of the table lands of Colima and Michoacan, but
only a small quantity of that is available for export. The state of
Michoacan is especially favored by climate, altitude, soil, and
surroundings to produce coffee of exceptionally high grade, and the
Uruapan is considered to be its best.

Trees flower in January and March, and in high altitudes as late as June
or July. Berries appear in July and are ripe for gathering in October or
November, the picking season lasting until February.

Trees begin to yield when two or three years old, producing from two to
four ounces. They reach full production, which is about one and a half
pounds, at the age of six or seven years, though in the districts of
Chiapas, Michoacan, Oaxaca, and Puebla, annual yields of three to five
pounds per tree have been reported.

Since the World War American buyers have shown greater interest in the
Tapachula coffee grown in Chiapas.

[Illustration: MEXICAN COFFEE PICKER, COATEPEC DISTRICT]

PORTO RICO. Coffee culture in Porto Rico dates from 1755 or even
earlier, having been introduced from the neighboring islands of
Martinique and Haiti. Count O’Reilly, writing of the island in the
eighteenth century, mentions that the coffee exports for five years
previous to 1765 amounted in value to $2,078. Old records show that in
1770 there was a crop of 700,000 pounds and that seems to be the first
evidence that the new industry was growing to any noticeable
proportions. For a hundred years, at least, only slow progress was made.
In 1768 the king, of Spain issued a royal decree exempting coffee
growers on the island from the payment of taxes or charges for a period
of five years; but even that measure was not materially successful in
stimulating interest and in developing cultivation.

Porto Rico is a good coffee-growing country; soil, climate, and
temperature are well adapted to the berry. The coffee belt extends
through the western half of the island, beginning in the hills along the
south coast around Ponce, and extending north through the center of the
island almost to Arecibo, near the west end of the north coast. But some
coffee is grown in the other parts of the island, in sixty-four of the
sixty-eight municipalities. Mountain sections are considered to be
superior.

The largest plantations are in the region which includes the
municipalities of Utuado, Adjuntas, Lares, Las Marias, Yauco, Maricao,
San Sebastian, Mayaguez, Ciales, and Ponce. With the exception of Ponce
and Mayaguez, all these districts are back from the coast; but insular
roads of recent construction make them now easily accessible, and there
is no point on the island more than twenty miles distant from the sea.

[Illustration: RECEIVING AND MEASURING THE RIPE BERRIES FROM THE
PICKERS, MEXICO]

From the Sierra Luquillo range, which rises to a height of 1,500 feet,
and from Yauco, Utuado, and Lares, come excellent coffees; and, on the
whole, these are considered to be the best coffee regions of the island.
A fine grade of coffee is also grown in the Ciales district. Figures
compiled by the Treasury Department of the insular government for the
purpose of taxation showed that for the tax year 1915-16 there were
167,137 acres of land planted to coffee and valued at $10,341,592, an
average of $61.87 per acre. In 1910, there were 151,000 acres planted in
coffee. In 1916 there were more than 5,000 separate coffee plantations.

Originally the coffee trees of Porto Rico were all of the _arabica_
variety. In recent years numerous others have been introduced, until in
1917 there were more than 2,500 trees of new descriptions on the island.

The virgin land in the interior of the island is admirably adapted to
the coffee tree, and less labor is required to prepare it for plantation
purposes than in many other coffee-growing countries. It is cleared in
the usual manner, and the trees are planted about eight feet apart, an
average of 680 trees to the acre. The seeds are planted in February; and
if the seedlings are transplanted, that is done when they are a year or
a year and a half old. The guama, a big strong tree of dense foliage, is
used for a wind-break on the ridges; and the guava, for shade in the
plantation. Plow cultivation is generally impossible on account of the
lay of the land, and only hoeing and spade work are done. Pruning is
carefully attended to as the trees become full grown.

Flowering is generally in February and March, or even later. Heavy rains
in April make a poor crop. Harvesting begins in September and extends
into January, during which time ten pickings are made.

[Illustration: SINGLE PORTO RICO COFFEE TREE IN FULL BEARING, PROPPED
UP WITH STAKES]

The average yield per acre is between 200 and 300 pounds; but expert
authority–Prof. O.F. Cook–in a statement made to the Committee on
Insular Affairs of the United States House of Representatives, in 1900,
held that under better cultural methods the yield could be increased to
800 or 900 pounds per acre. One estimator has calculated that an average
plantation of 100 acres had cost its owner at the end of six or seven
years, the bearing age, about $13,100 with yields of 75 pounds per acre
in the third and in the fourth years, 400 pounds per acre in the fifth
year, and 500 pounds in the sixth year, the income from which would
practically have met the cost to that time. It is held by the same
authority that an intensively cultivated, well-situated farm of selected
trees, 880 to the acre, should yield some 880 pounds of cleaned coffee
to the acre.

COSTA RICA. Costa Rica ranks next to Guatemala and Salvador among the
Central American countries as a producer of coffee, showing an average
annual yield in recent years of 35,000,000 pounds as compared with
Guatemala’s 80,000,000 and Salvador’s 75,000,000 pounds. Nicaragua has
an average annual production of 30,000,000 pounds.

Coffee was introduced into Costa Rica in the latter part of the
eighteenth century; one authority saying that the plants were brought
from Cuba in 1779 by a Spanish voyager, Navarro, and another saying that
the first trees were planted several years later by Padre Carazo, a
Spanish missionary coming from Jamaica. For more than a century six big
coffee trees standing in a courtyard in the city of Cartago were pointed
out to visitors as the very trees that Carazo had planted.

The coffee-producing districts are principally on the Pacific slope and
in the central plateaus of the interior. Plantations are located in the
provinces of Cartago, Tres Rios, San José, Heredia, and Alajuela. In the
province of Cartago are several extensive new estates on the slope to
the Atlantic coast. The San José and the Cartago districts are
considered by many to be the best naturally for the coffee tree. The
soil is an exceedingly rich black loam made up of continuous layers of
volcanic ashes and dust from three to fifteen feet deep. Preferable
altitudes for plantations range from 3,000 to 4,500 feet, although a
height of 5,000 feet is not out of use and there are some estates that
do fairly well on levels as low as 1,500 feet.

[Illustration: THE MODERN IDEA IN COFFEE CULTIVATION, COSTA RICA]

INDIA. Tradition has it that a Moslem pilgrim in the seventeenth century
brought from Mecca to India the first coffee seeds known in that
country. They were planted near a temple on a hill in Mysore called Baba
Budan, after the pilgrim; and from there the cultivation of coffee
gradually spread to neighboring districts. Aside from this legend,
nothing further is heard about coffee in India until the early part of
the nineteenth century, when its existence there was confirmed by the
granting of a charter to Fort Gloster, near Calcutta, authorizing that
place to become a coffee plantation.

[Illustration: PICKING COSTA RICA COFFEE]

[Illustration: COFFEE ESTATE IN THE MOUNTAINS OF COSTA RICA]

Planting was begun on the flat land of the plains, but the trees did not
thrive. Then the cultivation was extended to the hills in southern
India, especially in Mysore, where better success was achieved. The
first systematic plantation was established in 1840. For the most part,
the production has always been confined to southern India in the
elevated region near the southwestern coast. The coffee district
comprises the landward slopes of the Western Ghats, from Kanara to
Travancore.

About one-half of the coffee-producing area is in Mysore; and other
plantations are in Kurg (Coorg), the Madras districts of Malabar, and in
the Nilgiri hills, those regions having 86 percent of the whole area
under cultivation. Some coffee is grown also in other districts in
Madras, principally in Madura, Salem, and Coimbator, in Cochin, in
Travancore, and, on a restricted scale, in Burma, Assam, and Bombay. The
area returned as under coffee in 1885 was 237,448 acres; in 1896, as
303,944 acres. Since then there has been a progressive decrease on
account of damage from leaf diseases difficult to combat, and by
competition with Brazilian coffee.

New land that had just been planted with coffee in plantations reported
for 1919-20 amounted to 7,012 acres; while the area abandoned was 8,725
acres, representing a net decrease in cultivated area of 1,713 acres.

[Illustration: BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF A COFFEE ESTATE IN MYSORE, INDIA]

Of the total area devoted to coffee cultivation (126,919 acres), 49
percent was in Mysore, which yielded 35 percent of the total production;
while Madras, with 23 percent of the total area, yielded 38 percent of
the production. The total production for the year 1920-21 is reported as
26,902,471 pounds.

Yield varies throughout the country according to the methods of
cultivation and the condition of the season. On the best estates in a
good season, the yield per acre may be as high as 1,100 or 1,200 pounds,
and on poor estates it may not be over 200 or 300 pounds. The _arabica_
variety is chiefly cultivated. The _robusta_ and _Maragogipe_ have been
tried, but without much success.

A representative plantation is the Santaverre in Mysore, comprising 400
acres, at an elevation of from 4,000 to 4,500 feet, where the coffee
trees, cultivated under shade, produce from 100 to 250 tons of coffee a
year. Other prominent estates in Mysore are Cannon’s Baloor and
Mylemoney, the Hoskahn, and the Sumpigay Khan.

NICARAGUA. Coffee trees will grow well anywhere in Nicaragua, but the
best locations have altitudes of from 2,000 to 3,000 feet above sea
level. At such elevations the yield varies from one pound to five pounds
per tree annually; but above or below those, the average production
diminishes to from one pound to one-half pound a tree.

Lands most suitable for the berry are on the Sierra de Managua, in
Diriambe, San Marcos, and Jinotega, and about the base of the volcano
Monbacho near Granada. Good land is also found on the island Omotepe in
Lake Nicaragua, and around Boaco in the department of Chontales, where
cultivation was begun in 1893.

There are also plantations in the vicinity of Esteli and Lomati in the
department of Neuva Segovia. The most extensive operations are in the
departments of Managua, Carazo, Matagalpa, Chontales, and Jinotega, and
from those regions the annual crop has attained to such quantity that it
has become the chief agricultural product of the republic. Poor and
costly means of transportation on the Atlantic slope have operated to
retard the development of the industry there, even though conditions of
climate are not unfavorable.

[Illustration: COFFEE GROWING UNDER SHADE, UBBAN ESTATE, INDIA]

ABYSSINIA. In the absence of any conclusive evidence to the contrary,
the claim that coffee was first made known to modern man by the trees on
the mountains of the northeastern part of the continent of Africa may be
accepted without reserve. Undoubtedly the plant grew wild all through
tropical Africa; but its value as an addition to man’s dietary was
brought forth in Abyssinia.

Abyssinia, while it may have given coffee to the world, no longer
figures as a prime factor in supplying the world, and now exports only a
limited quantity. There are produced in the country two coffees known to
the trade as Harari and Abyssinian, the former being by far the more
important. The Harari is the fruit of cultivated _arabica_ trees grown
in the province of Harar, and mostly in the neighborhood of the city of
Harar, capital of the province. The Abyssianian is the fruit of wild
_arabica_ trees that grow mainly in the provinces of Sidamo, Kaffa, and
Guma.

The coffee of Harar is known to the trade as Mocha longberry or
Abyssinian longberry. Most of the plantations upon which it is raised
are owned by the native Hararis, Galla, and Abyssinians, although there
are a few Greek, German, and French planters. The trees are planted in
rows about twelve or fifteen feet apart, and comparatively little
attention is given to cultivation. Crops average two a year, and
sometimes even five in two years. The big yield is in December, January,
and February. The average crop is about seventy pounds, and is mostly
from small plots of from fifty to one hundred trees, there being no very
large plantations. All the coffee is brought into the city of Harar,
whence it is sent on mule-back to Dire-Daoua on the Franco-Ethiopian
Railway, and from there by rail to Jibuti. Some of it is exported
directly from Jibuti, and the rest is forwarded to Aden, in Arabia, for
re-exporting.

Abyssinian, or wild, coffee is also known as Kaffa coffee, from one of
the districts where it grows most abundantly in a state of nature. This
coffee has a smaller bean and is less rich in aroma and flavor than the
Harari; but the trees grow in such profusion that the possible supply,
at the minimum of labor in gathering, is practically unlimited. It is
said that in southwestern Abyssinia there are immense forests of it
that have never been encroached upon except at the outskirts, where the
natives lazily pick up the beans that have fallen to the ground. It is
shelled where it is found, in the most primitive fashion, and goes out
in a dirty, mixed condition.

Formerly, much of this Kaffa coffee was sent to market through Boromeda,
Harar, and Dire-Daoua. An average annual crop was about 6,000 bags, or
800,000 pounds, of which something more than one-half usually went
through Harar. A customs and trading station has lately been established
at Gambela, on the Sobat River: and with the development of this outlet,
there has been a substantial and increasing exploitation of the
wild-coffee plants since 1913. Large areas of land have been cleared,
with a view to cultivation, and attention is being given to improved
methods of harvesting and of preparing the coffee for the market. At one
time a fair amount of coffee from this region went to Adis Abeba on the
backs of pack mules, a journey of thirty-five or forty days, and then
was carried to Jibuti, nearly 500 miles, part of the way by rail. Now
practically all of it goes to Gambela, thence by steamers to Khartoum,
and by rail to the shipping-point at Port Sudan on the Red Sea.

OTHER AFRICAN COUNTRIES. Practically every part of Africa seems to be
suitable for coffee cultivation, even United South Africa, in the
southern part of the continent, producing 140,212 pounds in 1918. To
name all the countries in which it is grown would be to list nearly all
the political divisions of Africa. Among the largest producers are the
British East African Protectorate, 18,735,572 pounds in 1918; French
Somaliland, 11,222,736 pounds in 1917; Angola, 10,655,934 pounds in
1913; Uganda, 9,999,845 pounds in 1918; former German East Africa,
2,334,450 pounds in 1913; Cape Verde Islands, 1,442,910 pounds in 1916;
Madagascar, 707,676 pounds in 1918; Liberia, 761,300 pounds in 1917;
Eritrea, 728,840 pounds in 1918; St. Thomas and Prince’s Islands,
484,350 pounds in 1916; and the Belgian Congo, 375,000 pounds in 1917.

[Illustration: A GALLA COFFEE GROWER, AND HIS HELPER, IN HIS GROVE OF
YOUNG TREES NEAR HARAR]

ANGOLA. Coffee is Angola’s second product, and there are large areas of
wild-coffee trees. With a production of nearly 11,000,000 pounds, Angola
ranks about third in Africa as a coffee-growing country. The coffee is
gathered and sold by the natives, and there are also several European
companies engaged in the coffee business. The chief coffee belt extends
from the Quanza River northward to the Kongo at an altitude of 1,500 to
2,500 feet. In the Cazengo valley the wild trees are so thick that
thinning out is the only operation necessary to the plantation-owner.
When the trees become too tall, they are simply cut off about two feet
above ground; and new shoots appear from the trunks the following
season.

The largest coffee plantation, owned by the Companhia Agricola de
Cazengo, produced in 1913, a record year, nearly 1,500 tons.

LIBERIA. Coffee is native to Liberia, growing wild in the hinterland of
the negro republic, and in the natural state the trees often attain a
height of from thirty to forty feet. Cultivated Liberian coffee, _Coffea
liberica_, has become a staple of the civilized inhabitants of the
country, and is grown successfully in hot, moist lowlands or on hills
that are not much elevated. On account of the size of the trees, only
about four hundred can be planted to the acre. In recent years the
native Africans have been planting thousands of trees in the district of
Grand Cape Mount. Coffee is grown in all parts of the republic, but
chiefly in Grand Cape Mount and Montserrado.

GENERAL OUTLOOK IN AFRICA. In the African countries under control of
European governments much recent progress has been made in promoting
coffee growing and in improving methods of cultivation.

British interests were reported in 1919 as having started a movement
toward reviving interest in the coffee growing industry in the British
possessions in Africa. The report stated that Uganda, in the East
African Protectorate, had 21,000 acres under coffee cultivation, with
16,000 acres more in other parts of the Protectorate, and 1,300 acres in
Nyasaland; also that there is no hope of an immediate revival of the
industry in Natal, where it was killed twenty years ago by various
pests; “but it should certainly be established in the warmer parts of
Rhodesia; and in the northern part of the Transvaal an effort is being
made to bring this form of enterprise into practical existence.”

Coffee growing possibilities in British East Africa (Kenya Colony) are
alluring, according to reports from planters in that region. Late in
1920, Major C.J. Ross, a British government officer there, said that
“British East Africa is going to be one of the leading coffee countries
of the world.” Coffee grows wild in many parts of the Protectorate, but
the natives are too lazy to pick even the wild berries.

On the more advanced plantations in all parts of Africa the approved
cultivation methods of other leading countries are carefully followed;
especial care being given to weeding and pruning, because of the rank
growth of the tropics. On the whole, however, little attention is given
to intensive methods.

ARABIA. Whether the coffee tree was first discovered indigenous in the
mountains of Abyssinia, or in the Yemen district of Arabia, will
probably always be a matter of contention. Many writers of Europe and
Asia in the fifteenth century, when coffee was first brought to the
attention of the people of Europe, agree on Arabia; but there is good
reason to believe the plant was brought to Arabia from Abyssinia in the
sixth century.

Once all the coffee of Arabia went to the outside world through the port
of Mocha on the eastern coast of the Red Sea. Mocha, which never raised
any coffee, is no longer of commercial importance; but its name has been
permanently attached to the coffee of this country.

_Mocha_ (_Moka_, or _Morkha_) coffee (i.e. _Coffea arabica_) is raised
principally in the vilayet of Yemen, a district of southeastern Arabia.
Yemen extends from the north, southerly along the line of the Red Sea,
nearly to the Gulf of Aden. With the exception of a narrow strip of land
along the shores of the Red Sea, the Strait of Bab-el-Mandeb, and the
Gulf of Aden, it is a rugged, mountainous region, in which innumerable
small valleys at high elevations are irrigated by waters from the
melting snows of the mountains.

Coffee can be successfully grown in any part of Yemen, but its
cultivation is confined to a few widely scattered districts, and the
acreage is not large. The principal coffee regions are in the mountains
between Taiz and Ibb, and between Ibb and Yerim, and Yerim and Sanaa, on
the caravan route from Taiz to Sanaa; between Zabeed and Ibb, on the
route from Taiz to Zabeed; between Hajelah and Menakha, on the route
from Hodeida to Sanaa, and in the wild mountain ranges both to the north
and south of that route; between Beit-el-Fakih and Obal; and between
Manakha and Batham to the north of Bajil. The plant does best at
elevations ranging from 3,500 to 6,500 feet.

[Illustration: WILD KAFFA COFFEE TREES NEAR ADIS ABEBA]

In the Yemen district, coffee is generally grown in small gardens. Large
plantations, as they exist in other coffee-growing countries, are not
seen in Arabia. Many of these small farms may be parts of a large estate
belonging to some rich tribal chief. The native Arabs do not use coffee
in the way it is used elsewhere in the world. They drink _kisher_, a
beverage brewed from the husks of the berry and not from the bean.
Consequently, the entire crop goes into export. But bad conditions of
trade routes, political disturbances, and small regional wars, absence
of good cultivation methods, and heavy transit taxes imposed by the
government, have combined to restrict the production of Yemen coffee.

Land for the coffee gardens is selected on hill-slopes, and is terraced
with soil and small walls of stone until it reaches up like an
amphitheater–often to a considerable height. The soil is well
fertilized. For sowing, the seeds are thoroughly dried in ashes, and
after being placed in the ground, are carefully watched, watered, and
shaded. In about a year the shrub has grown to a height of twelve or
more inches. Seedlings in that condition are set out in the gardens in
rows, about ten to thirteen feet apart. The young trees receive moisture
from neighboring wells or from irrigation ditches, and are shaded by
bananas.

At maturity the trees reach a height of ten or fifteen feet. Since they
never lose all their leaves at one time, they appear always green, and
bear at the same time flowers and fruits, some of which are still green
while others are ripe or approaching maturity. Thus, in some districts,
the trees are considered to have two or even three crops a year. All the
trees begin to bear about the end of the third year.

[Illustration: A RARE PICTURE SHOWING MOCHA COFFEE GROWING ON TERRACES
IN YEMEN, ARABIA]

CUBA. Coffee can be grown in practically every island of the West
Indies, but owing to the state of civilization in many of the lesser
islands, little is produced for international trade, excepting in
Jamaica, Guadeloupe, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Trinidad, and
Tobago. In past years a considerable quantity of good-quality coffee was
produced in Cuba, the annual export in the decade of 1840 averaging
50,000,000 pounds. Severe hurricanes, adverse legislation, the rise of
coffee-growing in Brazil, the increase in cultivation of sugar and other
more profitable crops, practically eliminated Cuba from the
international coffee-export trade.

MARTINIQUE. This is a name well known to coffee men, the world over, as
the pioneer coffee-growing country of the western hemisphere. Gabriel de
Clieu introduced the coffee plant to the island in 1723 by bringing it
through many hardships from France. For a time, coffee flourished there,
but now practically none is grown. Such coffee as bears the name
Martinique in modern trade centers is produced in Guadeloupe, and is
only shipped through Martinique.

JAMAICA. Coffee was introduced into Jamaica in 1730; and so highly was
it regarded as a desirable addition to the agricultural resources of the
island, that the British Parliament in 1732 passed a special act
providing for the encouraging and fostering of its cultivation. Later,
it became one of the great staples of the country. Disastrous floods in
1815, and the gradual exhaustion of the best lands since then, have
brought about a decline of the industry, which is now confined to a few
estates in the Blue Mountains and to scattered “settler” or peasant
cultivation in the same districts but at lower altitudes.

The tree was formerly grown at all altitudes, from sea-level to 5,000
feet; but the best height for it is about 4,500 feet. Four parishes lead
in coffee producing: Manchester, with an area of 5,045 acres; St.
Thomas, with 2,315 acres; Clarendon, with 2,172 acres; St. Andrew, with
1,584 acres. Nine other parishes that raise coffee have less than 1,000
acres each under cultivation. There were 24,865 acres devoted to coffee
in 1900. In addition, it was estimated that there were 80,000 acres
suitable for the cultivation, nearly all being owned by the government.

[Illustration: PICKING BLUE MOUNTAIN BERRIES, JAMAICA]

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC. Coffee was once the leading staple in the Dominican
Republic as in the adjoining Haitian Republic; but in recent years
cacao, sugar, and tobacco have become the predominating crops. Said to
have the world’s richest and most productive soil, one-half of the
republic’s area is particularly suited to the cultivation of a good
grade of coffee of the highland type. But political and industrial
conditions have made for neglect of its cultivation by efficient
methods. Lack of suitable roads has also militated against the
development of the coffee industry.

In spite of many drawbacks, it is to be noted that, from the beginning
of the twentieth century, the coffee-growing area has been gradually
expanded until exports increased from less than 1,000,000 pounds to
5,029,316 pounds in 1918, although in the next two years there was a
recession in the total exports to 1,358,825 pounds in 1920.

The principal plantations are in the vicinity of the town of Moca and in
the districts of Santiago, Bani, and Barahona. Generally speaking, the
methods of cultivation in the Dominican Republic are somewhat crude as
compared with the practise in the larger countries of production in
Central America and South America.

GUADELOUPE. Guadeloupe has an area of 619 square miles, and about
one-third of this area is under cultivation. About 15,000 acres are in
coffee, giving employment to upward of 10,000 persons. The average yield
of a plantation of mature trees is about 535 pounds to the acre.

In the early years of the industry in Guadeloupe, production and export
were considerable. From old records it appears that in 1784 the exports
amounted to 7,500,000 pounds. During the closing years of the eighteenth
century the annual exports were from 6,500,000 to 8,500,000 pounds, and
in the beginning of the next century they registered about 6,000,000
pounds. Toward the middle of the nineteenth century the growing of sugar
cane overtopped that of coffee in profit, and many planters abandoned
coffee. After 1884, with the decadence of the sugar industry, coffee was
again favored, the government giving substantial encouragement by paying
bounties ranging from $15 to $19 per acre for all new coffee
plantations.

In recent years, considerable _liberica_ and _robusta_ have been planted
in place of the exhausted _arabica_.

[Illustration: COFFEE PICKERS RETURNING FROM THE FIELDS, GUADELOUPE]

TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO. The islands of Trinidad and Tobago are small
factors in international coffee trading. Coffee can be grown almost any
place on the islands; but its cultivation is confined principally to the
districts of Maracas, Aripo, and North Oropouche. Both the _arabica_ and
the _liberica_ varieties are grown.

HONDURAS. Soil, surface, and climate in Honduras, as far as they relate
to the cultivation of coffee, are similar to those of the adjoining
regions of Central America. The tree grows in the uplands of the
interior, thriving best at an altitude of from 1,500 to 4,000 feet.
Scarcity of labor and insufficient means of transportation have been the
chief obstacles in the way of the large development of the industry.

The departments of Santa Barbara, Copan, Cortez, La Paz, Choluteca, and
El Paraiso have the principal plantations. The ports of shipment are
Truxillo and Puerto Cortés. Annual production in recent years has been
about 5,000,000 pounds. In 1889 the United States imported 3,322,502
pounds, but in 1915 its importations fell away to 665,912 pounds.

BRITISH HONDURAS. British Honduras has never undertaken to raise coffee
on a commercial scale despite the fact that conditions are not
unfavorable to its cultivation. It has failed to produce enough even for
domestic consumption, importing most of what it has needed. Annual
production, as recorded in recent years, has been upward of 10,000
pounds.

[Illustration: THREE-YEAR-OLD COFFEE TREES IN BLOSSOM, PANAMA]

PANAMA. Panama presents a very favorable field for the growing of
coffee. The best district is situated in the uplands of the district of
Bugaba, where vast areas of the best lands for coffee-growing exist, and
where climatic and other conditions are most favorable to its growth.

No shade is required in this country; and the only cultivation consists
of three or four cleanings a year to keep down the weeds, as no plowing,
etc., are necessary. Coffee matures from October to January. Water power
being abundant, it is used for running all machinery.

The annual output of the province of Chiriqui, which produces the bulk
of the coffee, is approximately 4,000 sacks of 100 pounds each; all of
which is produced in the Boquete district at present, as the coffee
planted in the Bugaba section is still young and unproductive. The local
supply does not meet the domestic demand; and instead of exporting, a
great deal is imported from adjoining countries, although, there is a
protective tariff of six dollars per hundred pounds.

THE GUIANAS. Coffee has had a precarious existence in the Guianas.
Plants are said to have been brought by Dutch voyagers from Amsterdam in
1718 or 1720. They flourished in the new habitat to which they were
introduced, and in 1725 were carried from Dutch Guiana into the district
of Berbice in British Guiana and into French Guiana. There the berry was
a considerable success for a time; Berbice coffee especially acquiring a
good reputation; and when Demerara was settled, coffee became a staple
of that region. Shortage of native labor, and the difficulty of
procuring cheap and capable workers from outside the country, ultimately
compelled the practical abandonment of the crop in all three sections,
Dutch, French, and British. In British Guiana it is now grown mainly for
domestic consumption, and the same is true of French Guiana, which also
imports.

From the time of its introduction, about 1718, until about 1880, the
only coffee grown in Surinam, or Dutch Guiana, was the _Coffea arabica_.
It was not a bountiful producer, and with labor scarce and unreliable,
its cultivation was expensive. Therefore experiment was made with the
_liberica_ plant. This proved to be very satisfactory, growing
luxuriantly, producing abundantly, and requiring minimum labor in care.
In 1918 some 16,000,000 pounds were produced.

ECUADOR. Though not of great commercial importance, coffee in Ecuador
grows on both the mainland and on the adjacent islands. The area planted
to coffee is estimated at 32,000 acres having an aggregate of about
8,000,000 trees. The trees blossom in December, and the picking season
is through April, May and June. Coffee ranks third in value among the
exports of the country.

PERU. Although possessed of natural coffee land and climate, little has
been done to develop the industry in Peru. A finely flavored coffee
grows at an altitude of 7,000 feet, while that grown in the lowlands
along the Pacific coast is not so desirable. Such small quantities as
are grown are cultivated in the mountain districts of Choquisongo,
Cajamarca, Perene, Paucartambo, Chaucghamayo, and Huanace. The
Pacific-coast district of Paces-mayo also grows a not unimportant crop.

BOLIVIA. Comparatively little attention is given to coffee cultivation
in Bolivia. Agricultural methods are crude, and are limited to cutting
down weeds and undergrowth twice a year. The coffee is planted in small
patches, or as hedges along the roads or around the fields of other
crops. The first crop is picked at the end of one and a half or two
years. The trees bear for fifteen to twenty years. The average yield is
from three to eight pounds per tree. The best grades of coffee are grown
at 2,000 to 6,000 feet above sea level.

Coffee is cultivated in the departments of La Paz, Cochabamba, Santa
Cruz, El Beni, and Chuquisca. In the department of Santa Cruz there are
plantations in the provinces of Sara, Velasco, Chiquitos and Cordillera.
In the Yungas and the Apolobamba districts of La Paz, its cultivation
reaches the greatest importance, but even there is not of large
proportions.

CHILE, PARAGUAY, AND ARGENTINA. Coffee is of minor, almost
insignificant, importance in the agriculture of Chile, Paraguay, and
Argentina. In Uruguay the climate is altogether unsuitable for it.

Argentina and Paraguay each have small growing districts. In the first
named, only the provinces of Salta and Jujuy have, at the latest
reports, a little more than 3,000 acres under cultivation. In Paraguay
some householders have grown coffee in their yards solely for their own
use. In the Paraguayan district of Altos, north of Asuncion, a small
group of plantations was started before the outbreak of the World War,
and produced about 300,000 pounds of coffee in a year.

CEYLON. Coffee planting in Ceylon was an important industry for a
century, until the so-called Ceylon leaf disease attacked the
plantations in 1869, and a few years later had practically destroyed all
the trees of the country. Although coffee raising has continued since
then, there has been, especially since the beginning of the twentieth
century, a steady decline in acreage. There were 4,875 acres under
cultivation in 1903, 2,433 acres in 1907, 1,389 in 1912, and 941.5 in
1919. Only 2,200 pounds were produced in 1917. However, the climate and
soil of Ceylon seem adapted to coffee culture, and the experimental
stations at Peradeniya and Anuradhapura have been experimenting in
recent years with _robusta_, _canephora_, _Ugandæ_, and a _robusta_
hybrid for the purpose of reviving the industry in the country.

Ceylon is one of the oldest coffee-growing countries, the Arabs having
experimented with it there, according to legend, long before the
Portuguese seized the island in 1505. The Dutch, who gained control in
1658, continued the cultivation, and in 1690 introduced more systematic
methods. They sent a few pounds in 1721 to Amsterdam, where the coffee
brought a higher price than Java or Mocha. However, it was not until
after the British occupied the island in 1796, that coffee growing was
carried on extensively. The first British-owned upland plantation was
started in 1825 by Sir Edward Barnes; and for more than fifty years
thereafter coffee was one of the island’s leading products. An orgy of
speculation in coffee growing in Ceylon, in which £5,000,000 sterling
are said to have been invested, culminated in 1845 in the bursting of
the coffee bubble, and hundreds were ruined. The peak of the export
trade was reached in 1873, when 111,495,216 pounds of coffee were sent
out of the country. Even then, the plantations were suffering severely
from the leaf disease, which had appeared in 1869; and by 1887, the
coffee tree had practically disappeared from Ceylon. Ceylon’s day in
coffee was a cycle of fifty-odd years.

[Illustration: ROBUSTA COFFEE GROWING ON THE SUZANNAH ESTATE,
COCHIN-CHINA]

FRENCH INDO-CHINA. Coffee culture in French Indo-China is a
comparatively small factor in international trade, although production
is on the increase, particularly from those plantations planted to
_robusta_, _liberica_, and _excelsa_ varieties. The average annual
export for the five-year period ended with 1918 was 516,978 pounds,
nearly all of it going to France.

The first experiments with coffee growing were begun in 1887, near Hanoi
in Tonkin. The seeds were of the _arabica_ variety, brought from
Réunion, and the production from the first years was distributed
throughout the country to foster the industry. Eventually _arabica_ was
found unsuitable to the soil and climate, and experiments were begun
with _robusta_ and other hardier types.

A survey of the industry of the country in 1916 showed that the plant
was being successfully grown in the provinces of Tonkin, Anam, and
Cochin-China, and that altogether there were about 1,000,000 trees in
bearing. The plantations are mostly in the foot-hills of the mountain
ranges or on the slopes, although a few are located near the coast line
at 1,000 feet, or even less, above sea-level.

The larger and more successful plantations follow advanced methods of
planting and cultivating, while the government maintains experimental
stations for the purpose of fostering the industry. It is believed that
French Indo-China in coming years will assume an important position in
the coffee trade of the world, particularly as a source of supply for
France.

FEDERATED MALAY STATES, INCLUDING STRAITS SETTLEMENTS. Rubber has been
the chief cause of the decline of coffee industry in the Federated Malay
States. Since the closing years of the nineteenth century coffee has
been steadily on the downward path in acreage and production, with the
possible exception of parts of Straits Settlements, which in 1918
exported, mostly to England, some 3,500,000 pounds of good grade coffee.
The other sections of the federation shipped less than 1,000,000 pounds.

In the early days, planters of the Malay Peninsula knew little about
proper methods of cultivating, and depended mostly upon what they
learned of the practises in Ceylon, which, unfortunately for them, were
not at all suited to the Malay country. They secured their best crops
from lowlands where peaty soil prevailed, and eventually all the coffee
grown on the peninsula came from such regions.

_Liberica_ is mostly favored, and is grown with some success as an
inter-crop with cocoanuts and rubber. The _robusta_ variety has also
been introduced, but does not seem to do as well as the _liberica_.
Between 2,300 and 2,600 acres, according to recent returns, have been
under coffee as a catch-crop with cocoanuts, out of a total of 40,000
acres in cocoanut estates. One planter has been reported as making quite
a success with this method of inter-cropping for coffee, but it is not
generally approved.

There has been a general decline in acreage, product, and exports since
the closing years of the nineteenth century, until now the industry is
regarded as practically at a stand-still and likely so to remain as long
as rubber shall continue to hold the commercially high position to which
it has attained. Unsatisfactory prices realized for the crop, poor
growth of the trees in some localities, and the gradual weakening of the
trees under rubber as they mature, are offered as the principal
explanations of this decrease in acreage. Nearly all the Malay crop in
recent years has been grown in Selangor, though Negri Sembilan, Pahang,
and Perak continue as factors in the trade.

[Illustration: COFFEE TREES OF THE BOURBON VARIETY, FRENCH INDO-CHINA]

AUSTRALIA. Although Australia is a prospective coffee-growing country of
large natural possibilities, the _Australian Year Book_ for 1921 states
that Queensland is the one state in which experiments have been tried,
and that in 1919-20 there were only twenty-four acres under cultivation.
Queensland soils are of volcanic origin, exceptionally rich, and
support trees that are vigorous and prolific with a bean of fine
quality. The _arabica_ is chiefly cultivated, and the trees can be
successfully grown on the plains at sea-level as well as up to a height
of 1,500 or 2,000 feet. The trees mature earlier than in some other
countries. Planted in January, they frequently blossom in December of
the next year, or a month later, and yield a small crop in July or
August; that is, in about two years and a half from the time of
planting. The bean closely resembles the choice Blue Mountain coffee of
Jamaica. For coffee cultivation the labor cost is almost prohibitive.

[Illustration: PICKING COFFEE ON A NORTH QUEENSLAND PLANTATION]

As much as fifteen hundred-weight of beans per acre have been gathered
from trees in North Queensland; and for years the average was ten
hundred-weight per acre. After thirty years of cultivation, no signs of
disease have appeared. At late as 1920, the government was proposing to
make advances of fourteen cents a pound upon coffee in the parchment to
encourage the development of the industry to a point where it would be
possible for local coffee growers to capture at least the bulk of the
commonwealth’s import coffee trade of 2,605,240 pounds.

Coffee grows well in most all the islands of the Pacific Ocean, and in
some of them, as in the Philippines and Hawaii, the industry in past
years, reached considerable importance.

HAWAII. Coffee has been grown in Hawaii since 1825, from plants brought
from Brazil. It has also been said that seed was brought by Vancouver,
the British navigator, on his Pacific exploration voyage, 1791-94. Not,
however, until 1845 was an official record made of the crop, which was
then 248 pounds. The first plantations, started on the low levels, near
the sea, did not do well; and it was not until the trees were planted at
elevations of from 1,000 to 3,000 feet above sea-level that better
returns were obtained.

Coffee is grown on all the islands of the group, but nowhere to any
great extent except on Hawaii, which produces ninety-five percent of the
entire crop. Next in importance, though far behind, is the island of
Oahu. On Hawaii there are four principal coffee districts, Kona,
Hamakua, Puna, and Olaa. About four-fifths of the total output of the
islands is produced in Kona. At one time there were considerable coffee
areas in Maui and Kauai, but sugar cane eventually there took the place
of coffee.

[Illustration: COFFEE IN BLOSSOM, CAPTAIN COOK COFFEE COMPANY ESTATE,
KEALAKEKUA, KONA, HAWAII]

The Kona coffee district extends for many miles along the western slope
of the island of Hawaii and around famous Kealakekua Bay. The soil is
volcanic, and even rocky; but coffee trees flourish surprisingly well
among the rocks, and are said to bear a bean of superior quality.

Coffee trees in Kona are planted principally in the open, though
sometimes they are shaded by the native _kukui_ trees. They are grown
from seed in nurseries; and the seedlings, when one year old, are
transplanted in regular lines nine feet apart. In two years a small crop
is gathered, yielding from five to twelve bags of cleaned coffee per
acre. At three years of age the trees produce from eight to twenty bags
of cleaned coffee per acre, and from that time they are fully matured.
The ripening season is between September and January, and there are two
principal pickings. Many of the trees are classed as wild; that is, they
are not topped, and are cultivated in an irregular manner and are poorly
cared for; but they yield 700 or 800 pounds per acre. The fruit ripens
very uniformly, and is picked easily and at slight expense.

It is calculated that in the Hawaiian group more than 250,000 acres of
good coffee land are available and about 200,000 acres more of fair
quality. Comparatively little of this possible acreage has been put to
use. According to the census of 1889, there were then 6,451 acres
devoted to coffee, having, young and old, 3,225,743 bearing trees. The
yield, in that census year, was 2,297,000 pounds, of which 2,112,650
pounds were credited to Hawaii, the small remainder coming from Maui,
Oahu, Kauai, and Molokai.

A blight in 1855-56 set back the industry, many plantations being ruined
and then given over to sugar cane. After the blight had disappeared, the
plantations were re-established, and prosperity continued for years.
Following the American occupation of the islands in 1898, came another
period of depression. With the loss of the protective tariff that had
existed, prices fell to an unremunerativte figure; and the more
profitable sugar cane was taken up again. After 1912, the increased
demand for coffee, with higher prices, led again to hopes for the future
of the industry. Planting was encouraged; and it has been demonstrated
that from lands well selected and intelligently cultivated it is
possible to have a yield of from 1,200 to 2,100 pounds per acre.
Improvements have also been made in pulping and milling facilities. Many
of the plantations are cultivated by Japanese labor.

[Illustration: COFFEE GROWING UNDER SHADE, HAMAKUA, H.I.]

Exports of coffee from Hawaii to the principal countries of the world in
1920 were 2,573,300 pounds.

PHILIPPINE ISLANDS. Spanish missionaries from Mexico are said to have
carried the coffee plant to the Philippine Islands in the latter part of
the eighteenth century. At first it was cultivated in the province of La
Laguna; but afterward other provinces, notably Batangas and Cavite, took
it up; and in a short time the industry was one of the most important in
the islands. The coffee was of the _arabica_ variety. In the middle of
the eighteenth century, and after, the industry had a position of
importance; several provinces produced profitable crops that contributed
much to the wealth of the communities where the berry was cultivated. In
those days the city of Yipa was an important trading center. In the
period of its prime Philippine coffee enjoyed fine repute, especially in
Spain, Great Britain, and China (at Hong Kong), those three countries
being the largest consumers. At one time–in 1883 and 1884–the annual
export was 16,000,000 pounds, which demonstrates the importance of the
industry at the peak of its prosperity. The leaf blight appeared on the
island about 1889, causing destruction from which there has not yet been
complete recovery. The export of 3,086 pounds in 1917 shows the depths
into which the industry had fallen.

The Bureau of Agriculture at Manila announced in 1915 that an effort was
to be made to re-habilitate the coffee industry of the islands. Nothing
came of the effort, which died a-borning. Since then, several attempts
to introduce disease-resisting varieties of coffee from Java have failed
because of lack of interest on the part of the natives.

Despite the misfortunes that have overwhelmed it in the past and are now
retarding its growth, it is still believed that the industry in these
islands may be re-habilitated. Conditions of soil and climate are
favorable; land and labor are cheap, abundant, and dependable: railroads
run into the best coffee regions, and good cart roads are in process of
construction. Some plantations of consequence are still in existence,
and serious consideration is being given to their development and to
increasing their number.

[Illustration: THE COFFEE TREE THRIVES IN THE LAVA SOIL OF SOUTH KONA,
ISLAND OF HAWAII]

GUAM. Coffee is one of the commonest wild plants on the little island of
Guam. It grows around the houses like shade trees or flowering shrubs,
and nearly every family cultivates a small patch. Climate and soil are
favorable to it; and it flourishes, with abundant crops, from the
sea-level to the tops of the highest hills. The plants are set in
straight rows, from three and a half to seven feet apart, and are shaded
by banana trees or by cocoanut leaves stuck in the ground. There is no
production for export, scarcely enough for home consumption.

[Illustration: COFFEE PLANTATION NEAR SAGADA, BONTOC PROVINCE, P.I.]

OTHER PACIFIC ISLANDS. Other islands of the Pacific do not loom large in
coffee growing, though New Caledonia gives promise as a producer,
exporting 1,248,024 pounds in 1916, most of which was _robusta_. Tahiti
produces a fair coffee, but in no commercial quantity. In the Samoan
group there are plantations, small in number, in size, and in amount of
production. Several islands of the Fiji group are said to be well
adapted to coffee, but little is grown there and none for export.

[Illustration]

[Illustration: OWNER'S RESIDENCE ADJOINING DRYING GROUNDS ON ONE OF THE
LARGE ESTATES]

[Illustration: DRYING GROUNDS, FAZENDA SANTA ADELAIDE, RIBEIRAO PRETO]

[Illustration: COFFEE PREPARATION IN SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL]