say hello to…

COFFEE
THE COFFEE BEAN
 It is the most valuable agricultural commodity
of the world
 Genus Coffea, family Rubiaceae
 C. arabica
 C. canephora
 99% of total world output
 Lexicon Universal Encyclopedia, Deluxe Home Edition
ARABICA FLOWERS
First described by Antoine de Jussieu, who named it Jasminum arabicum
The flowers smells like Jasmine
ARABICA FRUITS
Coffee Shrub of Arabia
ROBUSTA PLANT AND FLOWERS
ROBUSTA FRUITS
Distinctive earthy flavor with more bitterness.
COFFEE BEAN STRUCTURE

1. Center Cut
2. Bean (endosperm)
3. Silver Skin (testa,
epidermis)
4. Parchment (hull,
endocarp)
5. Pectin Layer
6. Pulp (mesocarp)
7. Outer Skin (pericarp,
exocarp)
COFFEE CULTIVATION
 Coffee plant is an evergreen shrub or small tree
 4.6 to 6 meters high

 Cultivated in hot, moist climates

 Between 900 and 1800 meters above sea level
 Volcanic Soil
GROWS WELL ON…
 Islands of Java and Sumatra
 Arabia
 India
 Africa
 West Indies (Caribbean or ANTILLES! )
COFFEE GROWING
 Bears fruits in 5 to 8 years
 Annually yields more than 2 kilograms of fruit
 The red seed-bearing coffee “cherries”
 From the 2 kilo cherries, only ½ kilo of seeds are
obtained
RIPE CHERRIES
GREEN COFFEE SEEDS
TWO METHODS OF HARVESTING
 Selective Picking / Wet Method
 Beans are softened in water
 Depulped mechanically
 Fermented in large tanks
 Washed
 Dried in the open or in heated rotating
cylinders
TWO METHODS OF HARVESTING
 Shaking or Stripping / Dry Method
 Drying the beans
 Removing outer coverings
 Foreign Production Estimate Division, US Department of Agriculture

PRINCIPAL COFFEE PRODUCING COUNTRIES

Producing Country Production (in thousands of 6o kg bags)
CENTRAL AMERICA & CARIBBEAN
Costa Rica 2 300
Dominican Republic 910
El Salvador 2 600
Guatemala 2 900
Haiti 633
Honduras 1 400
Jamaica 30
Mexico 4 660
Nicaragua 750

TOTAL 16 800
Producing Country Production (in thousands of 6o kg bags)
SOUTH AMERICA
Brazil 16 500
Colombia 12 400
Ecuador 2 000
Peru 1 300
Venezuela 1 200

TOTAL 33 800
Producing Country Production (in thousands of 6o kg bags)
AFRICA
Angola 250
Burundi 500
Cameroon 1 900
Central African Republic 300
Ethiopia 3 150
Ivory Cost 4 833
Kenya 1 775
Madagascar 1 250
Rwanda 550
Sierra Leone 255
Tanzania 850
Togo 275
Uganda 3 000
Zaire 1 620
TOTAL 21 000
Producing Country Production (in thousands of 6o kg bags)
ASIA
India 2 333
Indonesia (“Java”) 5 800
Philippines 950
Thailand 500
Yemen 50

TOTAL 9 900

OCEANIA
Papua New Guinea 900

TOTAL 900
PROCESSING THE BEANS
 After thorough drying…
 Sorted
 Bagged
 Graded according to type and quality
 Shipped to processors
FLAVORS OF COFFEE
 The coffee flavor is determined not only by the
variety but also by the length of time green beans
are roasted.
 Dark Roasted coffees are stronger and mellower
than lightly roasted beans
INSTANT COFFEE: SPRAY-DRYING
 Prepared by forcing an atomized spray of very
strong coffee extract to through a jet of hot air.
This evaporates the water in the extract and
leaves the dried coffee particles
SPRAY-DRYING
More economical, short drying time, usefulness in heat-sensitive products
INSTANT COFFEE: FREEZE-DRYING
 Dehydration process typically used to preserve
perishable materials or more convenient to
transport
 Freezing the material
 Reducing the surrounding pressure
 Adding enough heat to allow frozen water to sublime
directly (solid → gas)
FREEZE-DRYING
Light weight, easier to transport
 How oh how did coffee come to life? 

OH! HERE’S A BRIEF HISTORY

ORIGINS?
 Some believe that is grown first in the Arabia
near Red Sea about 675 AD.
 Coffee cultivation was rare until the 15 th and 16th
Centuries when extensive panting of trees
occurred in Yemen region of Arabia.
THE OROMO PEOPLE
 Believed to have been the first to identify the
revitalizing effect of coffee.
 Oromo means “The Powerful”
 An ethnic group in Ethiopia
KALDI, THE ETHIOPIAN GOATHERDER
According to legends, he discovered the coffee plant
CREDIBLE EVIDENCE?
 15th Century in Sufi Monasteries around Mokha
in Yemen.
 Arabia is where coffee beans were first roasted
and brewed, in a similar way to how it is
prepared now.
 16th Century spread: Middle East, Persia, Turkey,
Northern Africa, Italy, and to the rest of Europe,
Indonesia and to the Americas.
POPE CLEMENT VIII
Coffee became a more popular beverage after it was deemed to be
a Christian Beverage
YEARS PASSED…
 1616 – Dutch smuggled seedlings from Mocha,
Yemen into Europe.
 Dutch were prompted to grow beans in their colonies
during the spread of coffee in Europe
 1645 – First European Coffee House in Italy
 1711 – Exports of Indonesian coffee from Java to
Netherlands
 1714 – French succeeded in bringing a live
cutting of a coffee tree to the island of Martinique
in the West Indies
COFFEE EXPORTS
 Because of the economic importance of coffee
exports, Latin American countries made
arrangements before World War II to allocate
export quotas to have an assured certain share of
the US coffee market
 1940 – First Coffee Quota Arrangement by the
Inter-American Coffee Board
 1962 – International Coffee Agreement by UN
COFFEE AS A CASH CROP
 Coffee has become a fundamental cash crop for
many Third World countries.
 Dependence on coffee as primary source of
income
 Primary export and backbone for African
countries as well as many Central American
Countries.