Asian firms led buyers for the Guatemalan coffee rated this year's best, local media reported here Thursday.
In a record-breaking auction here on Wednesday, some 90 firms bid for the award winners of the 11th annual Cup of Excellence competition, with firms from Asia leading the online buyers to secure the country's top coffees.
South Korea's GSC International and China's Shanghai Borong International Trading Co., Ltd bid successfully for the winning lot of 24 sacks from Guatemala's Kalibus La Sierra Farm, and also bought the second top coffee. Asian companies won the top five lots.
Guatemalan coffee fetched a record price at the event, with an overall price of 42.40 U.S. dollars per pound, or 609,727 U.S. dollars for 386 sacks weighing 60 kg each.
President of the National Association of Guatemalan Coffee (Anacafe) Nils Leporowski told media it was the "best price garnered at the auctions carried out this year in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Brazil, Honduras and Costa Rica."