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. In British Guiana it is now grown mainly for domestic consumption, and the same is true of French Guiana, which also imports. From the time of its introduction, about 1718, until about 1880, the only coffee grown in Surinam, or Dutch Guiana, was the _Coffea arabica_. It was not a bountiful producer, and with labor scarce and unreliable, its cultivation was expensive. Therefore experiment was made with the _liberica_ plant. This proved to be very satisfactory, growing luxuriantly, producing abundantly, and requiring minimum labor in care. In 1918 some 16,000,000 pounds were produced.