Dry conditions in Kenya forced the nation to slash coffee production targets by more than one-quarter for the 2010-2011 harvest, Bloomberg reports.
Rather than produce as many as 55,000 metric tons of coffee beans through September 30, the East African nation might produce 40,000 tons, according to James Wahome of the Kenya Coffee Board. The nation generated 45,000 metric tons for the 2009-2010 harvest.
"It wasn't a very good harvest between October and December," the board's quality manager told Bloomberg. "There was mostly dry weather and most of the coffee is rain-fed."
He said lower production will be offset by higher prices so, consequently, coffee export income is likely to scale as much as 7 percent this season to 16 billion shillings ($197 million).
The Nairobi Coffee Exchange oversees 85 percent of annual exports of coffee from Kenya, according to the coffee board run by the state. Three percent of Kenya's crop is consumed domestically.
The majority of Kenya's coffee harvest originates from the October-through-December crop. April-to-June's crop serves to bolster the earlier harvest.
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