SANCTIONS: Close to the Last Drop

Even after President Reagan imposed a trade embargo against Nicaragua's Sandinista regime in 1985, Americans partial to that country's rich coffee , could still find it in gourmet stores (at about $7 per lb.). The Administration allowed the coffee to be sold because it did not enter the U.S. directly from Nicaragua: foreign firms roasted and packaged the beans, then delivered them to American companies. But now the Treasury Department is considering an outright ban as a way of further pressuring the Sandinistas to become more democratic.

Such a move would be devastating for the small companies that have been importing $1.4 million worth of the coffee annually. Says Rink Dickinson, president of Boston-based Equal Exchange, which sells Nicaraguan coffee under its Cafe Nica label: "We feel the rug has been arbitrarily pulled out from under us." Sympathetic Congressmen are urging the Administration to drop the idea.