Economy

Demand for Brazilian coffee skyrockets in Colombia

It is becoming increasingly hard to find homegrown beans in Colombia. Instead, Brazilian coffee is far more widespread

Coffee deposit in Itabela, Bahia, Brazil. Photo: Joa Souza/Shutterstock
Coffee deposit in Itabela, Bahia, Brazil. Photo: Joa Souza/Shutterstock

In Colombia, finding a cup of coffee that uses domestic beans is becoming harder than ever. When ordering an americano in a Bogotá café or picking up a bag of grounds from a supermarket in Medellín, chances are you’re actually buying Brazilian beans. Why? The world’s second-largest arabica coffee producer is importing more beans than ever from its neighbors to the south in order to meet its domestic demand.

Between January and September of this year, almost 900,000 sacks of 20 kilograms were sent from Brazil to Colombia — 82.6 percent more than in the same period last year, according to data from the Brazilian Coffee Exporters Council (Cecafé).

Indeed, in five years, the volume of Brazilian coffee bought by Colombia has increased by almost 50 percent.

“Brazilian coffee is so good that not even Colombians can resist it,” jokes Cecafe technical director...

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