San Vicente Spring Coffee Harvest Begins

Twelve cooperatives are reporting record yields in the highland valleys, with the first lots already bound for buyers across the Republic. The annual harvest is expected to run through July.

The cooperatives credit two consecutive seasons of careful pruning and the gradual introduction of shade-grown techniques across the upper plantations. Quality assessments from regional cuppers have been uniformly favourable.

The cooperatives' technical advisor, María Ramírez, told the Herald that the shade-grown transition, now in its third full year, had reduced pesticide use across participating plantations by an average of forty-one percent. The bird population in the upper valleys, she noted, had been the subject of a separate study by the Tierra Verde Ornithological Society which would be published in the autumn.

Buyers in this year's harvest include the federal civil-service catering authority, which has committed to purchasing San Vicente arabica exclusively for use in the Assembly's restaurants from next month. Cooperative president Luis Camposana described the federal contract as "symbolically valuable but commercially modest" — accounting for roughly four percent of expected sales.