Jamaican Coffee Beyond Blue Mountain

Jamaican coffee is arabica grown across several of the island's mountainous parishes, not only in the world-famous Blue Mountains. Jamaica Blue Mountain coffee, covered in full on the Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee guide, is the country's best-known export, but it is grown by a minority of Jamaica's coffee farmers on a limited share of the island's coffee land.

Where else in Jamaica is coffee grown?

Coffee arrived in Jamaica in 1728, planted at Temple Hall in St Andrew, and by the early 1800s it was grown across much of the island's highlands, not just the Blue Mountains. Today, production is heavily concentrated in the legally defined Blue Mountain area of St Andrew, St Thomas and Portland. The Jamaica Gleaner reported in 2024 that other historical growing areas, including Manchester, St Ann and St Elizabeth, no longer see much expansion, though some coffee is still grown there.

Coffee grown outside the Blue Mountain boundary, wherever it meets JACRA's premium standard, can be sold as Jamaica High Mountain Supreme, covered on Jamaica High Mountain coffee vs Blue Mountain; a further trade grade, described on Jamaica Prime and Jamaica's other coffee grades, covers other non-Blue-Mountain coffee.

How big is Jamaica's coffee industry?

It is small by world standards. Perfect Daily Grind reported in 2025 that Jamaica ranks around 45th among the world's coffee-producing countries, and that Blue Mountain coffee specifically makes up under 0.01% of global coffee supply. The same report put the total number of Jamaican coffee farmers at roughly 8,270, of whom close to 6,000 farm in the Blue Mountain region, meaning a substantial share of the country's coffee farmers grow it elsewhere on the island.

Jamaica's coffee exports were worth about US$26.2 million in 2022, according to the Gleaner's 2024 analysis of trade data, sold mainly to Japan, the United States, Switzerland, China and Belgium. Separately, the Jamaica Coffee Exporters Association reported in 2024 that the coffee industry's revenue had averaged a weighted US$25 million a year over the previous 15 years, and said it was aiming considerably higher through renewed investment and marketing. Jamaica does not appear to publish production or revenue figures broken out separately for Blue Mountain versus non-Blue-Mountain coffee, so these totals cover the country's coffee sector as a whole.

A much bigger industry, once

Jamaica's coffee sector was far larger in the past. Perfect Daily Grind put historical production at around 70,000 tonnes a year between 1800 and 1840, when plantations across the island, including the Blue Mountains, were worked by enslaved people. Emancipation, completed in 1838, broke up many large estates, and coffee became mostly a smallholder crop. The history of Blue Mountain coffee guide covers this decline and the industry's later path in more detail.

What is grown, and what it's called

Jamaica grows three broad categories of coffee, all arabica. Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee, grown inside the mapped Blue Mountain boundary, is the only coffee allowed to use that name. Jamaica High Mountain Supreme Coffee is JACRA's term for the premium grades grown elsewhere in Jamaica. Below that sits a further, non-JACRA trade grade some importers call Prime Washed Jamaican.

All three are typically Typica, wet-processed, and sorted afterward by bean size into grades such as No. 1, No. 2, No. 3 and Peaberry.

The domestic market

Much of what Jamaicans drink locally is not Jamaican-grown. A March 2025 Jamaica Observer opinion piece stated that only about 30% of the coffee used in local blends sold in Jamaica is Blue Mountain coffee, with the remaining 70% imported from South American countries. This fits a rule in JACRA's own regulations: roasted coffee made from imported green beans and sold locally or exported from Jamaica must still contain Jamaican-grown coffee as at least 30% of its weight.

In short, high domestic prices and small local production push many Jamaican roasters and hotels toward cheaper imported beans for everyday blends, even in the country that grows Blue Mountain coffee. That is a striking gap for a country whose coffee has an international reputation, and it says more about relative price than about a lack of local pride in the crop. Non-Blue-Mountain Jamaican coffee, including the grades covered on Jamaica Prime and Jamaica's other coffee grades, tends to be the more affordable, homegrown option roasters reach for when they need to meet that 30% domestic-content rule without using Blue Mountain beans themselves.

Where Jamaican coffee is exported

Japan has bought the largest share of Jamaica's coffee exports since the 1960s, a relationship covered in detail on Blue Mountain coffee and Japan. The Gleaner's 2024 figures listed the United States, Switzerland, China and Belgium as other buyers in 2022.

Production and exports both vary from year to year; how much Blue Mountain coffee is produced looks at why, which helps explain why Jamaica's small coffee sector is especially sensitive to weather and to shifts in demand from its main markets.