The Costa Rica Coffee Institute (Icafe) emitted and early warning for the threat of coffee rust (Hemileia vastatrix) for four regions, reports The Costa Rica Star. These are: Central Valley, Coto Brus, Turrialba and Zona Norte (North Zone), where the weather conditions for these months puts the production in high risk.
“The current weather conditions favor the appearance of coffee rust. There will be important increases in the incidence of this disease during the months of July and August if the necessary preventive measures are not followed”, explains the release.
The areas of Western Valley, Los Santos and Perez Zeledon are under a moderated threat, at higher altitude higher threat.
“The presence of coffee rust is high and unusual for the first weeks of July, the increase obeys to the weather conditions that have been present so far, this situation will promote an accelerated progress of coffee rust during the month of August in the majority of coffee regions in the country,” said the Institute.
The percentage of national incidence of coffee rust in the plantations with disease controls increased by 4.7% in the last month.
