The bad harvest is being blamed on the scarcity of rain this spring.

"I'm worried for the industry," said Sotero Agoot, Jr., general manager of Kona Pacific Farmers Cooperative in Napoopoo, South Kona.

He said the price for Kona coffee may rise because most of the beans harvested this year may not meet the state Department of Agriculture standards for Kona beans. Therefore the coffee won't be suitable to be considered the famed and popular Kona coffee, he said.

"The scarcity problem is going to lead to some increasing in pricing," said Albert Kam, president of Superior Coffee & Foods/Hawaii.

A third coffee company farmer, Roger Coggburn of Coast Kona Coffee, said he has enough useless beans to make him think prices could rise as much as 20 percent.

Kona coffee has been dwindling as an industry since the 1950s and 1960s. Back then, about 22 million pounds were harvested from more than 6,000 acres. Currently about 2 million pounds are produced on 2,000 acres.

The answer to improving the coffee crops on the Big Island may be to increase fertilization, Agoot said. Many farmers only use half the amount fertilizer that is necessary, he said.