The lot that this year was best quoted in the international electronic auction reached US$30,009 dollars per hundredweight (quintal in Spanish) – 46 kilos – and the grain comes from Dota, in the Los Santos region of Costa Rica.
The high quality coffee is from the Don Cayito farm, receiving the best quote in the international electronic auction in the Cup of Excellence contest.
This price has not been reached before. The closest price was registered in the contest of 2017, when a Brazilian coffee obtained a price of US$13,020 per hundredweight.
Regarding the buyers of the Costa Rican coffee that was priced highest in the 2018 contest, Nacion.com that explains ” … The joint buyers were the Japanese companies Maruyama Coffee, Sarutahiko Coffee and Yamada Coffee, which are recognized in the international coffee market and are characterized by high specialty grain.”
In relation to the conditions where the winning grain, which is of the Geisha variety, was harvested, the article adds that ” … The farm where the winning coffee was harvested is at 1,950 meters altitude, in a place called La Bandera, about four kilometers from Santa María de Dota. The area is characterized by the excellent conditions for producing coffee of very high quality.”
The joint buyers were the Japanese companies Maruyama Coffee, Sarutahiko Coffee and Yamada Coffee, which are recognized in the international coffee market.
Maruyama Coffee has been a customer of all years in the Cup of Excellence auction, said Noelia Villalobos, executive director of the Fine Coffee Association of Costa Rica (SCACR).
In Costa Rica, the best price previously obtained for a fine coffee in this electronic auction was US$8,060 per quintal. It happened at the auction last year and was harvested at the Don Antonio farm, located in Copey de Dota.
The Cup of Excellence is an annual competition held in several countries to identify the highest quality coffees produced. It is organized by the Alliance for Coffee Excellence (ACE).
The competitions began in 1999. By 2013 they were held in Brazil, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Burundi, Rwanda, Colombia and Bolivia. In the course of the competition, each coffee is tested at least five times. Only those coffees that get high scores continuously move forward in the competition. The final winners are awarded the Cup of Excellence and sold via an internet auction to the highest bidder.
