The real start of the Thai coffee industry is relatively young. According to governmental statistics, the total coffee plantation area in 1960 was only about 19,000 rai (approximately 7,600 acres), producing a mere 750 tons of coffee. In the same year, Thailand had to import almost 6,000 tons of coffee. To improve the trade balance, the Thai government started a successful campaign promoting Robusta coffee growth in Southern Thailand.

This campaign was further cemented when opium crop replacement became an official Thai Government program in the 1970s. Supported by the Royal Family, the UN and many other governmental and non-governmental organizations, the hill tribe farmers in the Golden Triangle and along the borders of Burma and Laos started to grow Arabica coffee.

In 1976, Thailand officially became a coffee exporting nation, selling 850 tons of Robusta coffee in the world market. Helped by strong world market prices in the 1980s, exports thrived in the following years and culminated in 1991-2 at almost 60,000 tons. The collapse of the "International Coffee Agreement" in July 1989 and the following slump in world coffee prices has since hurt the coffee farmers hard.

Facing the threat of an oversupply situation, the Thai government made a turnaround and, under a 5-year-plan (1992-1997), began to encourage the coffee farmers to switch to other crops in an effort to reduce the total coffee planting area from a level of almost 500,000 rai (approximately 200,000 acres).