How Much Blue Mountain Coffee Is Produced?

Jamaica Blue Mountain coffee production is measured in boxes of cherry coffee picked each crop year, and it is small: recent figures from the Jamaica Coffee Exporters Association put the 2022/23 crop at about 285,000 boxes, up from roughly 240,000 boxes the year before, with weather cutting into the following season's harvest.

How much Blue Mountain coffee is produced today

The Jamaica Coffee Exporters Association (JCEA) reported in 2024 that the Blue Mountain crop grew from about 240,000 boxes of cherry coffee in the 2021/22 crop year to about 285,000 boxes in 2022/23, a 17% increase. JACRA had projected around 300,000 boxes for 2023/24, but the JCEA said adverse rain during peak harvest cost the industry at least 50,000 boxes that season.

The estimated farm-gate value of the weather-related loss in 2023/24 was about J$480 million. A box of cherry coffee is the standard local unit growers are paid by; it is later processed down into a smaller weight of exportable green beans.

Certified area and number of farmers

Perfect Daily Grind reported in 2025 that about 14,000 acres are certified for Blue Mountain coffee production, worked by close to 6,000 farmers, roughly 80% of whom farm under five acres each. The JCEA's own 2024 figures put the number of coffee farmers at around 5,000. The two counts are close enough to treat Jamaica's Blue Mountain coffee farming as an industry of a few thousand mostly small growers, rather than a small number of large estates; estates profiles some of the producers that do operate at estate scale.

Dividing the certified acreage by either farmer count implies an average holding of only about two to three acres per farmer, consistent with the emphasis both Perfect Daily Grind and the JCEA place on smallholders rather than large estates.

Why the crop is small in world terms

Jamaica is a minor coffee producer by world standards. Perfect Daily Grind put the country around 45th among coffee-growing nations in 2025, with Blue Mountain coffee alone making up under 0.01% of global coffee supply. The JCEA reported the industry's revenue at a weighted average of about US$25 million a year over the previous 15 years, and said it was targeting US$50 million and eventually US$100 million annually through expansion. None of the industry figures reviewed for this guide broke that revenue down between Blue Mountain and non-Blue-Mountain sales specifically, so the US$25 million average covers Jamaica's coffee sector as a whole.

For comparison, Perfect Daily Grind put Jamaica's coffee production at around 70,000 tonnes a year at its historical peak, between 1800 and 1840, a period covered in more depth on history. Today's crop is a small fraction of that.

Why output swings from year to year

Several factors cause swings that an industry this size feels more sharply than a large producer would. Weather is one: the JCEA's reported 50,000-box loss in 2023/24 came from rain during peak harvest, and hurricanes and Blue Mountain coffee covers storm risk specifically.

Yields are another factor. A March 2025 Jamaica Observer opinion piece put average yields at about 23 boxes per acre, far below the 200-plus boxes the author argued proper farm management could achieve, pointing to gaps in inputs, extension support and aging trees as ongoing constraints. Pests and disease also affect output; the coffee berry borer in Jamaica covers one of the pest risks Jamaican growers manage, alongside coffee leaf rust. Because most farms are small and family-run, a bad season for an individual grower, whether from a storm, a pest outbreak, or simply being unable to afford fertilizer that year, shows up quickly in the total crop.

What growth would take

The JCEA's 2024 statement set a goal of reaching about 450,000 boxes a year within four years, alongside the revenue targets above, through what it described as renewed investment and marketing. Reaching that would mean roughly reversing years of underinvestment reflected in the low average yields cited above, on a base of several thousand mostly small farms working land already close to its certified 14,000-acre limit.

Because the Blue Mountain name is legally tied to a fixed geographic area, described on certification, growth in this coffee specifically has to come from higher yields on existing land, not from planting new area outside the boundary. Expanding the certified area itself would require JACRA to amend the Blue Mountain boundary set out in its regulations, a legal and administrative step separate from simply planting more trees. Coffee grown elsewhere in Jamaica falls under different names, covered on Jamaican coffee beyond Blue Mountain.