The original agreement was signed in 1962 for a five-year period, and since then there have been seven subsequent agreements, ratified in 1968, 1976, 1983, 1994, 2001, 2007 and 2022.
Background The precursor to the ICA was the Inter-American Coffee Agreement (IACA) established during the
Second World War. The war had created the conditions for a Latin American coffee agreement: European markets were closed off, the price of coffee was in decline and the United States feared that the declining price could drive Latin American countries—especially Brazil—towards
Nazi or Communist sympathies. The agreement had an immediate effect, the price almost doubled by the end of 1941. until 1955–57 when a degree of
equilibrium was reached. Producers sought ways to maintain the price, this led to the first International Coffee Agreement. When the indicator price set by the
International Coffee Organization (ICO) fell below the target price, quotas were decreased; if it rose above it, quotas were increased.
Breakdown of the 1989 agreement In 1989, ICO failed to reach an agreement on new export quotas, causing the 1983 ICA to break down. The disagreement was triggered by consumers' change in taste towards milder and higher quality coffee. ICO's average indicator price for the last five years previous the end of the regime fell from US$1.34 per pound, to US$0.77 per pound for the first five years after. ==Members==