BizAims

Coffee is one of the most consumed beverages of the world. It is prepared from roasted beans of the coffee plant. The origin of the English word coffee came from the Italian caffè. This, in turn, was borrowed from Persian Ghahveh, Ottoman Turkish kahveh, the Arabic qahwa collectively. Although the origin of the Arabic and Persian terms is uncertain, it is believed to be derived from the name of the Kaffa, an Ethiopian region in Africa, where the coffee plant was first discovered and cultivated.

After it was discovered in Ethiopia, where it still grows wild, the coffee plant spread to Yemen and Egypt. Yemen is considered to be the first region where the coffee plant was first cultivated. For many centuries it was considered to be the world's primary source of coffee. Most of the coffee exported to European markets came from the ports of Alexandria and Constantinople. As these ports were highly guarded by the arabians, Muslim pilgrims during their pilgrimages to Mecca managed to smuggle coffee plants to India By the fifteenth century it had reached the rest of the Middle East, Persia, Turkey, and northern Africa. From the Muslim world, coffee spread to Italy. And in 1645 the Italian opened the first European coffee house. In 1690 the Dutch smuggled out seeds and established coffee cultivation in their colony Java and Ceylon. The Dutch were the first to transport and cultivate coffee commercially, defying the Arab prohibition on the exportation of plants or unroasted seeds. In France the coffee plant was introduced in 1657. Later Latin America also started to cultivate coffee, when the French brought a seedling to Martinique.

In North Brazil the coffee growing started in 1727, to Rio de Janeiro and  > to the States of San Paolo and Minas between 1800 - 1850, where coffee found its ideal environment. The coffee plant belongs to the Rubiacee family. Nearly 60 species of it are growing in the subtropical areas but only 210 species are cultivated around the world.

The coffee plant is an evergreen tree which high ranges from 3 to 5 meters, while the wild plant may reach 10-12 meters high. Propagating this plant through cutting is quite difficult, because it requires maximum light and a maximum humidity of close to 90%. That’s why it is usually propagated by seeds. The seeds of this plant are called “beans” and they are used to prepare the beverage we call coffee. Coffee beans are cultivated in the tropics where the rainfall is abundant and the temperatures vary from 15 to 25 degrees C. The altitude a coffee tree grows is from 400 meters to 2200, but the best altitude is from 600 and 1200 meters. It takes 4-5 years for a coffee tree to yield fruits, and when it does it will be productive for 50-60 years or even 100 years.

The blossom of the coffee tree is similar to jasmine in color and smell. The leaves are dark-green and usually 10-15 centimeters long and 6 centimeters wide. The fruits produced by the tree are called coffee cherries that become red, more or less dark, depending on the plant variety. The usually contains two coffee beans (seeds). >In about 5-10% of any crop of coffee cherries, the cherry will contain only a single bean, rather than the two usually found. This is called a 'peaberry' and contains a distinctly different flavor profile to the normal crop, with a higher concentration of the flavors, especially acidity, present due to the smaller sized bean. As such, it is usually removed from the yield and either sold separately (such as in New Guinea Peaberry), or discarded. To produce a maximum yield of coffee berries (800-1400 kg per hectare), the plants need substantial amounts of water and fertilizer. Calcium carbonate and other lime minerals are sometimes used to reduce acidity in the soil, which can occur due to run off of minerals from the soil in mountainous areas. The caffeine content in coffee beans is a natural defense, the toxic substance repelling many creatures that would otherwise eat the seeds, as with nicotine in tobacco leaves.

The most cultivated species are Coffea arabica or Arabica coffee and Coffea canephore or Robusta coffee. Coffea Arabica represents three-quarters of world coffee production. The Arabica makes a flavor full-bodied coffee, sharp in taste, with rather low caffeine content. Although there are different tastes, because of the different crop varieties. And there are so many varieties on the market that one can assert that some low-quality Arabica species are actually inferior to the best qualities of Coffee Robusta. Arabica beans look slightly elongated, with greenish-blue shades.

Coffea Robusta grows quickly in altitudes up to 600 meters with a high yield per plant, and is more resistant to parasites and deseases then the Arabica Coffee It is widely spread, where the climate is unsuitable for Coffee Arabica, especially in Africa, Asia and Indonesia. It represents about one quarter of total world production. Because of their higher content of caffeine (about twice as much as Arabica) and strong character, Robustas are used mostly in specialty blends. Overuse and/or improper processing can result in cheap- and bitter-tasting coffee, with pronounced "woodiness", a typical characteristic of natural Robustas from Africa. Its beans are typically small, rounded and brownish-yellow in appearance.