Arabfields, Naïla Mokhtari, Special Economic Correspondent, São Paulo, Brazil — Colombia’s coffee sector, the world’s leading supplier of mild arabica, has entered a period of sharp contraction in 2026, posting its most significant monthly production drop in recent history. Fresh data confirms that after a stellar 2025, the industry is now grappling with the severe consequences of adverse weather, dashing hopes for sustained growth and forcing a strategic pivot towards quality over quantity.
The statistics for February 2026 are stark. National coffee production plummeted to just 869,000 60-kilogram bags, a dramatic 36% collapse compared to the same month last year. This figure extends a troubling trend from January, which had already seen a steep 34% decline. The impact is not limited to a single month, looking at the last twelve months from March 2025 to February 2026, total production sits at 12.72 million bags, marking a 14% drop from the previous cycle. This slump is a direct reversal of fortune for a sector that had just celebrated its best annual output in 33 years, having closed the 2024-2025 coffee year with a remarkable 14.87 million bags.
This sharp decline in output has inevitably crippled the country’s export capacity. Preliminary figures show that February exports fell by 32% year-on-year, totaling just 807,000 bags. For the current coffee year, which began in October 2025, the situation is equally concerning. Between October and February, Colombia has exported 5.06 million bags, a 14% decrease from the same period in the previous year, directly translating to a lower availability of Colombian coffee for the world.
The root cause of this downturn is overwhelmingly climatic. Industry leaders and technical analyses point to excessive and untimely rainfall that has wreaked havoc on the delicate biological processes of the coffee plant. The persistent humidity has severely impacted the critical flowering stage and subsequent grain development, directly reducing the potential yield of the current harvest. This is not merely a short-term fluctuation but a structural shock to the production cycle.
Looking ahead, the future forecasts for 2026 offer little immediate respite. Projections indicate that production for the entire 2025-2026 coffee year will settle at around 12.8 million bags, a significant step down from the previous year’s record. The outlook for the first half of the calendar year is particularly subdued, with an official forecast of just 6.2 million bags expected to be produced between January and June. This projected scarcity is already influencing market strategy, as when facing a more selective, reduced supply, the industry’s path forward is not to sell more, but to sell better, focusing on premium quality and strengthening relationships with discerning buyers.
Paradoxically, while the national harvest falters, domestic consumption and imports tell a different story. The internal demand for coffee remains remarkably robust, holding steady at 2.3 million bags annually, a sign of the ingrained nature of coffee in Colombian culture. To meet this steady demand, particularly for industrial processing, Colombia has been forced to turn to the international market. Coffee imports in February reached an estimated 116,000 bags, and over the last twelve months, they have soared to 1.32 million bags, primarily to complement the supply for local industry. This dynamic is underscored by the strength of the domestic market, the total coffee category in Colombia has reached a staggering $3 billion in sales, a 28% increase in value, indicating that consumers are willing to pay more for quality, even as overall volume grows only modestly.
The economic pain is most acutely felt at the farm level. The combination of lower production volumes and market pressures has driven the domestic purchase price down to its lowest point in 16 months. By mid-February, the price per 125-kilo load of dry parchment coffee had fallen to $2.08 million pesos. This price slump, juxtaposed with rising imports, creates a deeply challenging environment for the 540,000 families whose livelihoods depend on coffee cultivation. The value added by permanent coffee crops has already shown a decline, contracting by 2.2% in 2025, with an even steeper quarterly drop of 22.1% at the end of the year.
In response to this crisis, the national federation is advocating for immediate counter-cyclical measures to bolster productivity. These measures focus on intensifying fertilization and accelerating the renovation of coffee plantations to rejuvenate aging, less productive trees and consolidate the next production cycle. This is a long-term bet, an acknowledgment that while the climate is beyond control, the resilience of the crop can be strengthened. Simultaneously, the strategy of differentiation is being aggressively pursued. The recent inauguration of the world’s first flagship store in Bogotá is a physical manifestation of this pivot, aiming to elevate the consumer experience, reinforce the connection to the origin, and command premium prices that can trickle down to the producer.
The current crisis in Colombia is a microcosm of a larger global challenge. Recent studies highlight the increasing threat of damaging heat in the world’s top coffee-producing nations. In Colombia, an average of 119 days per year now experience temperatures detrimental to coffee cultivation, with 48 of those days directly attributable to carbon pollution. This scientific data reinforces the urgency of adaptation. The push for agroforestry systems, sustainable soil management, and varietal diversification are not just commercial strategies but essential steps for survival in a warming world. The coming months will test the mettle of Colombia’s coffee growers, but their history of resilience and the strength of their institutional framework provide a foundation for navigating this bitter turn in the market cycle.
