Brazil produces nearly 30% of the world’s coffee and almost 60% more than the next closest country. They’ve been the world leader for the last 150 years and have around 220,000 active coffee farms. Production primarily is along the southeastern coast of the country with some Robusta crops thriving on the southwestern border.
Much of Brazil’s coffee is lower quality and earmarked for instant coffee. This isn’t surprising, as producing this much sheer volume requires some economies of scale and less attention to detail, such as mass mechanical harvesting that frequently picks unripe coffee cherries. And while coffee plants thrive in Brazil, the country lacks mountainous volcanic growing regions, which have long produced some of the world’s highest-grade Arabica coffees.
