The story
Coffee reached Mexico in the 1700s. The green-coffee trader Sucafina says Spanish settlers brought trees from Cuba and the Dominican Republic, and that the first plantings were most likely in Veracruz, where the commercial trade began. Early estates were often run by German and Italian migrants, with Indigenous people working the land. Over time the farms spread from Veracruz into Oaxaca and Chiapas.
According to the importer Cafe Imports, coffee only grew into a real industry in the late 1800s and early 1900s, when farms were broken up after independence and small farmers, many of them Indigenous, began growing it. Sucafina links today's pattern of small farms partly to land redistribution after the 1910 revolution, and says much of the coffee land is now held communally: the community assigns plots, and a family keeps the right to farm one as long as it is cultivated.
Mexico is a large producer. Sucafina ranks it ninth in the world, at about 3.1 million 60 kg bags a year, grown by more than 500,000 farmers. It says 70 percent of producers farm less than 10 hectares, and Cafe Imports puts the typical farm at 1 to 5 hectares.
Coffee grows in many states. Sucafina says about 90 percent comes from four in the south, Chiapas, Oaxaca, Veracruz and Puebla, where altitude and climate suit it. Cafe Imports' list of growing regions also includes Guerrero, Colima, Hidalgo, Jalisco, Michoacán, Nayarit and San Luis Potosí. In Puebla, the state agriculture office says Arabica is grown in the Sierra Norte, Nororiental and Negra between 700 and 1,800 metres.
The last 40 years have been hard. A national coffee institute, INMECAFE, offered growers technical help and credit, but it was closed in 1989, the same year the International Coffee Agreement's price system broke down. Both importers say this left many small farmers without support. A severe outbreak of coffee leaf rust in 2012 cut production by almost half, Sucafina says, and many farms have since replanted with rust-resistant varieties such as Catimor. Young people leaving for cities and the United States add to labour shortages at harvest.
Cooperatives have been one response. Since the 1990s many small farmers have joined cooperatives to sell certified coffee, and Mexico is one of the largest exporters of organic and Fairtrade coffee. Cafe Imports says these certifications are especially common in Oaxaca, Veracruz and Chiapas, and that Indigenous farming traditions, which often match organic methods, have helped drive the move to organic. Sucafina notes that many small farms are organic by default, though rust pressure makes the future of certified organic coffee less certain.
How it's processed
A coffee bean is the seed inside a small fruit called a cherry. After picking, the fruit has to come off and the seed has to dry, and the method shapes the flavour.
Cafe Imports lists Mexico's processing as washed or mechanically demucilaged. In a washed coffee the skin and sticky fruit layer (the mucilage) are removed before drying, traditionally by fermenting in water. Mechanical demucilaging uses a machine to strip that layer instead, with the same aim of a clean, washed-style coffee.
Neither source we checked describes natural or honey processing as common in Mexico, so we list only washed here. Some individual lots may differ, and the details on each coffee are the better guide.
Many farmers sell their coffee to middlemen who blend lots together, Sucafina says. Cafe Imports reports that keeping lots apart by farm, altitude and variety is becoming more common, and Sucafina says a growing home market and direct deals with roasters are giving some producers more control over how their coffee is sold.
The main harvest runs from about November to March, according to both importers.
What it tastes like
Mexican coffee has a long reputation as a mild, low-cost blending coffee. Cafe Imports describes the older style as nutty and chocolatey with gentle citrus acidity.
Higher-grown coffee can be quite different. Cafe Imports describes high-grown Mexican lots with more complex citric and malic (apple-like) acidity, sweetness along the lines of chocolate and toffee, and a clean cup. It also mentions fruity and floral coffees from Mexico.
Variety plays a part. Traditional types such as Typica, Bourbon, Caturra and Garnica are still widely grown, alongside rust-resistant varieties such as Catimor, Marsellesa and Oro Azteca. With so many regions, farm sizes and varieties, flavours vary widely, and the tasting notes on each coffee are a better guide than any country-wide rule.