El Paraiso have the principal plantations. The ports of shipment are
Truxillo and Puerto Cortes. Annual production in recent years has been
about 5,000,000 pounds. In 1889 the United States imported 3,322,502
pounds, but in 1915 its importations fell away to 665,912 pounds.

BRITISH HONDURAS. British Honduras has never undertaken to raise coffee
on a commercial scale despite the fact that conditions are not
unfavorable to its cultivation. It has failed to produce enough even for
domestic consumption, importing most of what it has needed. Annual
production, as recorded in recent years, has been upward of 10,000
pounds.

[Illustration: THREE-YEAR-OLD COFFEE TREES IN BLOSSOM, PANAMA]

PANAMA. Panama presents a very favorable field for the growing of
coffee. The best district is situated in the uplands of the district of
Bugaba, where vast areas of the best lands for coffee-growing exist, and
where climatic and other conditions are most favorable to its growth.

No shade is required in this country; and the only cultivation consists
of three or four cleanings a year to keep down the weeds, as no plowing,
etc., are necessary. Coffee matures from October to January. Water power
being abundant, it is used for running all machinery.

The annual output of the province of Chiriqui, which produces the bulk
of the coffee, is approximately 4,000 sacks of 100 pounds each; all of
which is produced in the Boquete district at present, as the coffee
planted in the Bugaba section is still young and unproductive. The local
supply does not meet the domestic demand; and instead of exporting, a
great deal is imported from adjoining countries, although, there is a
protective tariff of six dollars per hundred pounds.

THE GUIANAS. Coffee has had a precarious existence in the Guianas.
Plants are said to have been brought by Dutch voyagers from Amsterdam in
1718 or 1720. They flourished in the new habitat to which they were
introduced, and in 1725 were carried from Dutch Guiana into the district
of Berbice in British Guiana and into French Guiana. There the berry was
a considerable success for a time; Berbice coffee especially acquiring a
good reputation; and when Demerara was settled, coffee became a staple
of that region. Shortage of native labor, and the difficulty of
procuring cheap and capable workers from outside the country, ultimately
compelled the practical abandonment of the crop in all three sections,
Dutch, French, and British.