COFFEE farmers are vexed that export sales are down amidst high level visits by international coffee buyers this month.

This week a group of German café and coffee stakeholders will visit the Blue Mountain coffee factories. It follows last week’s visit by a powerful Japanese body, which called for a further reduction in the price of Blue Mountain Coffee (BMC) at a time when cash-strapped local coffee companies are investing millions to retool.

“Sadly it’s a good crop this year,” stated farmer Basil Williams who cultivates five acres for sale to Clifford Mount, which locally trades as Coffee Traders and operators of Café Blue. “The price is down,” he noted.

Added Errol South, a farmer who operates 12 acres: “The price has declined by as much as 50 per cent in real terms. We used to get $3,000 per box and now get $1,500.”

Coffee, the island’s second largest crop export earner, (behind sugar) already saw its export earning down nearly half year-on-year to US$17.4 million ($1.5 billion) over eight months to August 2010 according to the latest data. The ongoing recession in Japan has resulted in the reduced pace of purchases and also the reduction in the price at which it is sold. The regulator, the Coffee Industry Board (CIB), has facilitated promotions by US-based Starbucks and also in China with Hangzhou City Coffee and Western Cuisine Association to attenuate the decline.