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Shipments from the largest coffee exporter in Central America totaled 1,027,214 60-kg bags in March, compared with 633,594 bags in the same month of the 2015-2016 harvest, according to a preliminary report from IHCAFE.
Cumulative October-through-March shipments totaled 3.22 million bags, up almost 38 percent from the year-earlier period, when shipments totaled 2.34 million bags.
IHCAFE expects exports to grow more than 40 percent this year to 7.2 million bags in the 2016-2017 harvest.
The coffee season in Central America and Mexico, which together produce about a fifth of the world's arabica beans, runs from October through September.