The presence of small-scale producers has a history in Costa Rica. Since Costa Rica had little in the way of Gold or other resources that the Spanish Royalty was interested in, very few colonists chose it as a destination. As coffee became more popular, new farms and mew coffee growers sprouted up because of the acute lack of cheap labor. Since indigenous populations were so small in Costa Rica, the colonists who wanted to participate in the profits of the coffee trade, had to work their own land. This is the main reason that the majority of coffee producders were small producers, a fact that continues to be true today.
Production has a comparable breakdown.
All of these coffee producers, except the integrated producers, are essentially growers only. They produce green coffee, which is then sold to processing plants called beneficios where it is washed, de-pulped, and dried. Beneficios are powerful in the chain of coffee production and partially control the prices paid to the growers. Coffee trees growing on a hillside At this time, the 1950's, new political leadership began to profoundly transform the coffee industry. These changes were welcomed and cooperatives consisting of small and medium producers began competing with privately-owned beneficios, or coffee processing plants.