GCR Mar 2021

March/April 2021 GENETIC POTENTIAL

CIRAD explores the possibilities of three wild coffee species

HELD TO ACCOUNT

Why sustainable commitments and transparent action are two different things

THE TRUE VALUE OF COFFEE

The ICO unveils its latest Coffee Development Report on the global value chain

COSTA RICAN CHARM

Central America’s oldest coffee producing country embraces sustainable models of production

STEP INTO

THE LIGHT

NAIROBI COFFEE EXCHANGE CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER DANIEL MBITHI ON TRANSFORMING KENYA’S COFFEE PRODUCTION WITH TECHNOLOGY AND REFORMS THAT GIVE PRODUCERS GREATER ACCESS TO THE INTERNATIONAL MARKET www.gcrmag.com

CONTENTS March/April 2021

COVER STORY

STEP INTO THE LIGHT

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Nairobi Coffee Exchange Chief Executive Officer Daniel Mbithi on revitalising Kenya’s coffee production with technology and reforms that are set to boost competitiveness and prove why coffee is more than a cash crop.

IN THIS ISSUE FEATURES 8

STEP INTO THE LIGHT

Nairobi Coffee Exchange CEO Daniel Mbithi on innovating Kenya’s auction methods for a more competitive and secure market

12 HELD TO ACCOUNT

The 2020 Coffee Barometer reveals more transparent action to sustainability commitments is needed

16 THE TRUE VALUE OF COFFEE

The ICO unveils its latest report on the economic sustainability, inclusiveness and resilience of the coffee global value chain

42 GENETIC POTENTIAL

CIRAD explores the possibilities of three wild coffee species that could diversify production

48 SOLID SERVE TO CAPSULE STUDY Professor Chahan Yeretzian on extracting a series of guidelines to achieve a stable extraction process

SOLUBLE COFFEE

34 INSTANT ACHIEVEMENT

Buencafé reaches new heights thanks to a focus on quality with the Sensoria by Buencafé technology concept

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36 RTD MADE EASY

Flavourtech on shifting the quality perspective of ready to drink and soluble coffee

38 LAND OF OPPORTUNITY

Neuhaus Neotec and Devex turn their attention to the US market

40 SOMETHING IN THE WATER

Phenolaeis is devoted to transforming health with flavour and functional benefits

PROFILE

24 BE BETTER, BE DIFFERENT

Cama Group discusses the fast changing packaging market and differentiating in a competitive landscape

26 KOREAN CALLING

Aspen Korea on inducting global cleaning solution specialist Cafetto into the Korean market

could contribute to the value chain at origin

45 ONE WILD RIDE

Dr Timothy Schilling reflects on a professional career that has inspired and improved the future of coffee for the better

50 LEADING THE WAY

“THE WORLD NEEDS TO KNOW WE ARE DOING EVERYTHING TO ENSURE CONSISTENCY AND QUALITY OF OUR SUPPLY. WE WANT ALL EYES ON KENYA.” Daniel Mbithi

NAIROBI COFFEE EXCHANGE CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER

Since 1840, Bewley’s has helped grow Ireland’s coffee culture and is sharing it with the world

ORIGIN

20 COSTA RICAN CHARM

How Central America’s oldest coffee producing country has built an industry based on quality

LAST WORD

58 GUIDING LIGHT

The 2020 Specialty Coffee Transaction Guide provides insight a sometimes mysterious segment of the market

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28 SERVICE WITH A SMILE

Smile Beverage Works and Ima Coffee bring sustainable single serve solutions to the US market

32 THE CHERRY ON TOP

How Continuous Coffee Cherry processing

REGULARS 04 06 54 56

EDITOR’S NOTE NEWS DRIP BY DRIP DIARY DASHBOARD MARKETPLACE

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EDITOR’S NOTE Global Coffee Report

PUBLISHER Christine Clancy christine.clancy@primecreative.com.au EDITOR Sarah Baker sarah.baker@primecreative.com.au JOURNALIST Ethan Miller ethan.miller@primecreative.com.au

BE THE LIGHT DESPITE THE DOOM AND GLOOM so often portrayed in worldwide media, the year started off with a sign of hope in 22-yearold youth poet laureate Amanda Gorman, who took to the lectern at President Joe Biden’s inauguration on 20 January. Each line was spoken with power and purpose, and each hand gesture and pause a reminder of her control and attempt to evoke a message to the world about a country that can heal with unity.

She concluded her speech in front of more than 30 million TV viewers with a line that’s been stuck in my head ever since: “there is always light, if only we’re brave enough to see it, if only we’re brave enough to be it”.

On reflection on what was a volatile and tumultuous year for many in the global coffee sector, there are many organisations and individuals who are the light we need to guide our industry into the next stage of evolution.

In Kenya, Nairobi Coffee Exchange Chief Executive Officer Daniel Mbithi is an example of the light. Thanks to the induction of a new digital trading platform, he is helping lead a transformation for the sale of Kenyan coffee that is more competitive, more transparent to the international market, and more rewarding for thousands of smallholder Kenyan farmers.

The results are physically evident. As Mbithi said in our interview for the cover of Global Coffee Report, “we are smiling. The prices are beginning to smile, and when we smile the famer smiles, and when the farmer smiles the world smiles”.

Another shining light is the release of the International Coffee Organization’s second flagship Coffee Development Report, which

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includes finding more ways for billions of small-scale farmers who produce a large share of the world’s coffee, to benefit more from the wealth that flows into the sector.

Dr Timothy Schilling is the light. The retiring scientist, Founder, and President of World Coffee Research most profoundly helped rebuild Rwanda’s agricultural sector when it was still largely suffering the aftereffects of the Rwandan genocide. Not only did he help lead the coffee sector’s transformation into a quality product, but in doing so aided 400,000 Rwandan farmers to increase the income they received for their crops. The impact is evident when Schilling returns to the communities he assisted for more than a decade with tears in his eyes. Children in the street wear nice dresses and shoes, families live in houses with roofs not straw huts, and the volume of hair salons all point to a revitalised country and community far better off.

As we move into another year of challenges, volatility and potential upheaval, let the words of Amanda Gorman empower us to be our own light for the good of the international coffee community and the lives within it.

Sarah Baker Editor, Global Coffee Report

DESIGN PRODUCTION MANAGER Michelle Weston michelle.weston@primecreative.com.au ART DIRECTOR Blake Storey blake.storey@primecreative.com.au DESIGN Madeline McCarty, Kerry Pert BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT AND MARKETING ACCOUNT MANAGER Courtney Walker courtney.walker@primecreative.com.au CLIENT SUCCESS Ben Griffiths ben.griffiths@primecreative.com.au CONTRIBUTORS Kamal Bengougam PHOTOGRAPHY Andrew Kibe at Kybe Photography, Ethos Agriculture, Blackwood Creative, CIRAD HEAD OFFICE Prime Creative Pty Ltd 11-15 Buckhurst Street South Melbourne VIC 3205 Australia p: +61 3 9690 8766 f: +61 3 9682 0044 enquiries@primecreative.com.au www.gcrmag.com SUBSCRIPTIONS +61 3 9690 8766 subscriptions@primecreative.com.au

Global Coffee Report Magazine is available by subscription from the publisher. The rights of refusal are reserved by the publisher.

ARTICLES

All articles submitted for publication become the property of the publisher. The Editor reserves the right to adjust any article to conform with the magazine format.

COPYRIGHT

Global Coffee Report is owned and published by Prime Creative Media. All material in Global Coffee Report Magazine is copyright and no part may be reproduced or copied in any form or by any means (graphic, electronic or mechanical including information and retrieval systems) without written permission of the publisher. The Editor welcomes contributions but reserves the right to accept or reject any material. While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of information Prime Creative Media will not accept responsibility for errors or omissions or for any consequences arising from reliance on information published. The opinions expressed in Global Coffee Report are not necessarily the opinions of, or endorsed by the publisher unless otherwise stated.

NEWS DRIPBYDRIP AFRICA According to government reports, Kenya’s production has steadily been in decline from an all-time high of 140,000 metric tonnes to 40,000 metric tonnes annually, grown by an estimated 700,000 smallholder farmers. The government hopes to raise production to 100,000 metric tonnes annually.

In 2020, the Ministry of Agriculture launched a Sh1.5 billion (about US$15 million) coffee revitalisation plan, focusing on eight Kenyan counties that account for 70 per cent of coffee production in the country.

See page 8.

See page 54.

AMERICAS

According to the United States Development Authority’s Foreign Agricultural Service, Costa

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RE-Coffee developed a new method for processing coffee cherries based on its Spin Cold Brew method.

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Rican coffee production reached 1.47 million 60-kilogram bags in its 2019/2020 crop year. It estimates the 2019/2020 crop year will reach 1.5 million bags.

See page 20.

Smile Beverage Werks is a Benefit “B” Corporation aiming to make single serve coffee more sustainable. Expecting fast growth in this category, the company required a partner with strong R&D concepts, the ability to adapt quickly and recommend and implement changes, and fast commercialisation.

See page 28.

Buencafé’s ability to adapt was put to the test at the start of 2020, when the onset of COVID-19 restrictions saw many customers need to make sudden changes to their orders. It reported its strongest sales results ever in 2020, with sales above US$160 million, up 9 per cent versus 2019.

See page 34.

Costa Rican coffee production reached 1.47 million 60-kilogram bags in its 2019/2020 crop year.

20 Palm Fruit Extract, as a 100-percent water soluble powder, can be mixed in roasted and ground coffee and in ready-to-drink and single serve formats. Phenolaeis’ functional freeze-dried coffee contains 5 per cent Palm Fruit Extract to optimise flavour, antioxidant and other wellness benefits based on benchtop and clinical research.

See page 40.

Scientist and World Coffee Research Founder and President, Dr. Timothy Schilling, is

concluding 20 professional years in the coffee industry. His work began with a project in Rwanda, helping producers improve quality to achieve a price of $1.40 US cents per pound when the market was only offering 45 US cents.

See page 45.

See page 54.

ASIA PACIFIC

Since its establishment in 1998, Aspen Korea has been committed to nurturing its growth as the exclusive distributor of brands and products for Korean coffee businesses in the B2B and B2C market space. One such partnership that has endured nine years of commitment is Aspen’s distribution of Cafetto cleaning products to the Korean market.

See page 26.

The Flavourtech Spinning Cone Column extracts, captures, and protects the natural aromas and volatile compounds using steam at a low temperature of around 100°C in just 25 seconds.

See page 36.

NEWS In brief

The 2020 Specialty Coffee Transaction Guide lists US$2.60 per pound as the median middle free-onboard price paid for specialty coffee in coffee year 2019/2020. This is down 15 US cents from the 2018/2019 coffee year, which the guide suggests was caused by a move from higherquality, more expensive coffees towards higher-volume and lowerscoring specialty coffees.

See page 58.

Bewley’s celebrated its 180th anniversary at the end of 2020.

See page 54.

EUROPE

The global coffee industry’s 10 largest roasters and its five biggest represents approximately 35 per cent of all coffee roasted and 50 per cent of all coffee traded, in an industry worth US$55 billion in 2019. These companies hold a large degree of influence over the market, and according to the 2020 Coffee Barometer report, are doing too little to advance sustainability and are not adequately reporting their progress.

See page 12.

The expansion of the coffee Global Value Chain is driven by the private sector, but governments need to provide an enabling environment.

Higher-income regions such as Europe and North America accounted for more than 96 per cent of roasted coffee exports and 53 per cent of soluble coffee exports in 2018, indicating that processing activities primarily occur in higher-income regions that rely strongly on green coffee imports from the producing lower-income regions.

See page 16.

At a Cama Group roundtable discussion, European market leaders identified premiumisation as a leading trend in all sectors of the market.

Masteroast Coffee in the United Kingdom said single serve and coffee

50 bags are an easy, low-cost platform, which made up 10 to 15 per cent of its overall volumes last year. It anticipates these will account for 30 to 40 per cent of its volume in 2021.

See page 24.

Using the Continuous Coffee Cherry process, instead of separating the pulp and skin from the beans, freshly harvested, undried and unfermented whole coffee cherries are wet milled with cold water. This results in three different coffee fruit extracts.

See page 32.

Traditional drip filter used to outsell coffee outsold cold brew In American coffee shops, but that has now changed. While cold brew is on the rise in America for now, it might not be forever, so equipment suppliers like Neuhaus Neotec need to offer solutions that are adaptive to different demands.

See page 38.

Climate change poses a challenge in the future as temperatures rise and weather becomes erratic. To address this, CIRAD has begun analysing wild coffee species

to determine their viability for coffee cultivation.

See page 42.

The global coffee pod and capsule market combined is expected to grow from US$15 billion in 2017 to US$29 billion by 2025, according to Fior Markets, at a compound annular growth rate of 8.5 per cent. The high-pressure extraction capsules segment alone, the focus of an October 2020 in Scientific Reports, currently leads the coffee pod and capsule market, and was valued at around US$9.61 billion in 2017 (63 per cent of the whole single serve coffee segment).

See page 48.

Bewley’s celebrated its 180th anniversary, a year where it reached an annual turnover of €200 million (about US$240 million). Bewley’s was the first brand in Ireland to import Fairtrade certified coffee in 1996 and now contributes 1.5 per cent of all Fairtrade premiums paid to coffee farmers globally.

See page 50.

$2.60

The median middle US FOB price paid per pound for specialty coffee in coffee year 2019/2020, according to the 2020 SCTG.

M A R C H/A P R I L 2 0 2 1 | GCR

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COVER STORY NCE

A STEP INTO THE LIGHT NAIROBI COFFEE EXCHANGE CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER DANIEL MBITHI ON REVITALISING KENYA’S COFFEE PRODUCTION WITH TECHNOLOGY AND REFORMS THAT ARE SET TO BOOST COMPETITIVENESS AND PROVE WHY COFFEE IS MORE THAN A CASH CROP.

M

uch like housing auctions that draw crowds each week to watch a pin-pong battle of prices before the agent yells “sold”, coffee auctions in Kenya attract a similar fanfare.

Producers and buyers travel from far and wide to watch crops go under the hammer at Kenya’s central coffee auction, the Nairobi Coffee Exchange (NCE), but in March 2020, the Kenyan government enforced the closure of its physical trading floor due to the looming threat of coronavirus.

Trading stopped for two weeks with NCE Chief Executive Officer Daniel Mbithi and his team seeking solutions to resume trading. As the auction could not fall back on a remote buying system, the sale of coffee became problematic.

“We couldn’t continue the auction in a safe way. COVID-19 cases were rising in Nairobi and there was a greater risk to have everyone gathered in a usually packed auction house. At first, I started using Google Sheets to record auction prices, but a more sustainable solution was needed,” Mbithi tells Global Coffee Report.

Belgium business automation specialist Aucxis came to the rescue. In 1998, Aucxis helped automate the coffee bidding process, changing the operation from the commonly known open-outcry model to push buttons. It delivered NCE with the first electronic auction system which is faithfully used as the main instrument for pricing coffee to the local market.

This time around, Aucxis presented Kosmos, a real-time auction system via ‘the cloud’. Kosmos had previously supported the ‘falling price’ mechanism, which is used as standard for the sale of agricultural products such as flowers, fruit, and vegetables, but never for coffee and Kenya’s ‘falling/ rising’ principle.

In this auction method, the price on a clock counts down at a set speed until someone pushes a button. In contrast to the Dutch auction, no transaction is closed at that moment, but via a time bar which starts running during a set time. This is considered the “last call” to make a higher bid. If one or several other buyers also push their buy button before the time bar runs out, the price goes up at a set time interval. The process is repeated until one bidder remains.

With such precise needs, Aucxis faced important software changes to its Kosmos system before rolling out the upgraded clock model mid-2020. The result is a digital trading platform that means prospective buyers are no longer needed to physically come to NCE’s auction house in Nairobi’s gruelling traffic to attend weekly auctions, and they can participate in a “COVID-safe” way. Farmers

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can also watch the results unfold, with TV screens mounted at six stations in producing regions.

“We didn’t know what Kosmos was, how it worked or how to embrace it,” Mbithi says.

“Initially there was some trepidation, but over time and with more consistent use, we have seen a significant increase in the confidence of buyers, participation, and competitive prices.

It’s a unique experience for Africa. It’s made a big difference to our operations. It took us out of paralysis and spared the NCE. It transformed us.”

Mbithi wants to believe the Kenyan coffee market is becoming more competitive. After years of changing regulations, reforms, and low coffee prices, he is confident the country is turning a corner thanks to small improvements such as the new remote buying system, which he is confident will increase buyer participation.

“We can’t afford to be comfortable and not innovate. Thanks to the new Kosmos system it means more people will be pushing to buy a particular coffee, and they can do it from any country in the world via our platform. In fact, on 27 January a buyer participated in the auction all the way from India and managed to be the second leading buyer without hitches at all. That is a total transformation,” he says.

“We have a system to connect Kenyan farmers to the world. We are no longer where we used

Images: Kybe Photography

Daniel Mbithi is determined to innovate the NCE and its processes, including the introduction of a digital trading platform.

M A R C H/A P R I L 2 0 2 1 | GCR

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COVER STORY NCE

to be thanks to coronavirus. Prior to Christmas we were securing coffees for well over US$6 per kilogram, the highest recorded price for the year. We are smiling. Even the prices are beginning to smile, and when we smile the farmer smiles, and when the farmer smiles the world smiles.”

HISTORY IN THE MAKING The NCE was created as a division of the Coffee Board of Kenya (CBK), first established in 1934 as a statutory body after the enactment of the coffee industry ordinance of 1933. The CBK was tasked with the responsibility of carrying out the regulation and marketing of Kenya’s coffee. As such, the first coffee auction took place in 1935 to enhance the quality of Kenyan coffee through grading assessment. This role has changed over time through the various law amendments to liberalise the coffee industry.

Until 2001, the CBK served as a regulator and the sole marketing agent for all coffee in Kenya. It’s mandate then changed to regulation only and Kenya Coffee Auctions ran the NCE for Daniel Mbithi is committed to empowering Kenyan coffee farmers to a period of time, followed by the Kenyan Coffee Producers and obtain the best prices for their coffees.

Traders Association.

Up until 2006, the NCE was the sole marketing channel for Kenyan coffee until a new legislation known as “the second window” allowed private export companies to trade directly with producers and form direct relationships, in what Mbithi describes as a “complement” more than “competition” to the NCE. “We thrive on competition, so if we don’t offer what the farmer or producer is looking for, they have an option to bypass us and sell their coffee elsewhere. We have between 80 to 100 licensed coffee buyers who compete with the NCE and buy from all over the world – Asia, Europe, America – so to trade 85 per cent of Kenya’s total coffee through the NCE is pretty remarkable,” Mbithi says.

“There’s always alternative options, but what buyers can be assured of when they work with the NCE, is trust in our stringent systems, and consistent, traceable coffee. We have rules in place to ensure fair play on the trading floor, and that there is no manipulation. Coffee is not just allowed to go for any price, the farmer is allowed to set a price for their coffee and if it doesn’t attract this price it may be withdrawn from sale and sold in a subsequent sale. We try to empower the farmer as much as possible, but there’s still more to do.”

The importance of transparency in coffee trading was brought into the fold thanks to Kenya’s Crops Coffee General Regulations, 2019, and CMA (Capital Markets Authority) Coffee Exchanges Regulations, 2020. These laws mandate the regulation and supervision of coffee auctions and license the NCE and brokers acting as selling agents for farmers. Under these regulations, all industry players, including county governments, cooperatives and traders were required to digitise their operations in attempt to stamp out price manipulations by unscrupulous stakeholders.

“Most of the time, the producer has no idea what happens to their coffee after it’s delivered to the dry mill. They simply receive money in their bank account. We want to bridge the gap between the market and producer. It’s a very big gap. Unfortunately, many producers think we [the NCE] are a butchery to rip them off, but it couldn’t be further from the truth. We are doing everything we can for them to prosper,” Mbithi says.

The Capital Markets (Coffee Exchange) Regulations 2020 stipulates the establishment and operationalisation of a direct settlement system for expedited and transparent payment of coffee sales proceeds. As such prompt payments must be made to farmers within five days of purchase to ensure they do not miss out on price increments. Mbithi says the new laws will help ensure Kenya’s coffee market grow and display the continued importance of the industry to the country’s economy and millions of Kenyan livelihoods.

“With these changes the NCE is more empowered to offer better services to farmers. Whatever is sold through the NCE must be distributed via a central point, not from marketing agents, so that any

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credits to the producer are recovered,” he says.

“It also means the possibility of growing NCE further, linking farmers to the international market, and disseminating the system to all players in the value chain. We are at the point of transition.”

THE POWER TO OVERCOME Mbithi says the major challenge for Kenyan coffee is its low productivity, which some attribute to poor prices, agronomic practices, the expense of fertilisers, and institutional weakness. Such challenges have even forced some smallholder farmers to abandon crops.

According to government reports, Kenya’s production has steadily been in decline from an all-time high of 140,000 metric tonnes to 40,000 metric tonnes annually, grown by an estimated 700,000 smallholder farmers.

The government hopes to raise production to 100,000 metric tonnes annually.

In 2020, the Ministry of Agriculture launched a Sh1.5 billion (about US$15 million) coffee revitalisation plan, focusing on eight Kenyan counties that account for 70 per cent of coffee production in the country. The plan aims to help improve production and the quality of coffee for those counties that have been in a steady decline. It includes the revival of coffee farming, training, fertiliser subsidies, propagation of seeds and improved primary processing infrastructure, and the refurbishing

of coffee factory and mills.

“The government is doing a lot of work to get coffee into people’s lives to make it a coffee drinking culture. Eighty per cent of Kenyans are Christians. When the missionaries came to Kenya, they pulled people from traditional brews to tea, not coffee. Coffee was only seen as an export product, so people naturally got used to tea more than coffee,” Mbithi says.

“Sadly, local consumption is about the economy of our pockets. We cannot afford to drink good Arabicas, so the majority of local consumption is imported coffee, but that’s what the government is trying to change. It’s even going into colleges and universities to promote and educate the community that Kenya does produce quality Arabica and increasingly Robusta coffee, and that it’s done right in our backyard.”

COMMITTED TO THE CAUSE Mbithi is a proud Kenyan with coffee in his soul and farmer livelihoods in his heart. He grew up in the producing region of Machakos,

Kangundo. His father was a small-scale coffee farmer, and has nostalgic memories of tending to his father’s crops each day.

“Before I went to sleep and each morning before going to school each day, I would pick two containers of coffee, and if it wasn’t done, I’d go to school late,” he recalls.

Mbithi has been part of the coffee industry ever since he left school. He entered the coffee industry in the early 90s, first working with the CBK, which, at the time, was the industry regulator and sole marketing agent for Kenyan coffee. He worked on its payment system until laws changed in 2002 permitting the creation of offshoot department, the NCE. Mbithi joined in 2006 as its sole employee, using the auction room as his office.

“I’ve worked in various positions in the industry but the NCE is where the action is. I want to be amongst it, working through the challenges, working face to face with farmers and traders to achieve the best results – price wise for the farmer and that the traders get the quality Kenyan coffee is known for,” he says.

“The NCE stands on its own. We still have room for growth, and the journey so far has not been easy, but I am committed to doing my best despite the challenges to ensure the farmer’s produce is accessible by traders and sold for a good price.”

With new reforms, enhanced technology and a renewed focus on how coffee can contribute to the growth of Kenya’s economy, Mbithi is excited by its potential and the role the NCE can play.

“We want people to know who we are and what’s happening in Kenya. The world needs to know we are doing everything to ensure consistency and quality of our supply. We want all eyes on Kenya,” Mbithi says.

“I truly believe this is a year for NCE to be on top of the treetops telling everyone what we’re doing as we continue to innovate. If I go home tomorrow, I can look back and smile at the position NCE is in.” G C R

2027 Held to account FEATURE Coffee Barometer

2025

THE WORLD’S LARGEST COFFEE COMPANIES MAY BE MAKING COMMITMENTS TO SUSTAINABILITY, BUT TRANSPARENT ACTION IS STILL NEEDED ACCORDING TO THE 2020 COFFEE BAROMETER REPORT.

S 2024

ustainability is a topic that can no longer be ignored in the coffee sector, and many of the world’s largest roasters and traders have made commitments to reduce their impact. However, according to the 2020 Coffee Barometer, companies are doing too little and are not adequately reporting their progress.

The biennial report – the result of a collaboration between Conservation International, Hivos, Oxfam Belgium, and Solidaridad, and produced by Ethos Agriculture – provides an overview of sustainability in the sector.

Sjoerd Panhuysen, lead author of the Coffee Barometer, tells Global Coffee Report each edition approaches sustainability from a perspective relevant to the industry at the time. With 2020 marking the end of a decade and a deadline many companies had set for their commitments, he says the paper’s writers chose to use it as a chance for reflection.

“We wanted to look back at the last 10 years and figure out where we are now, what has changed, the level of maturity of the discussions, and where we are going in the next couple of years,” Panhuysen says. “We see quite a lot of talk in the sector about the [United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals] (SDGs) and how we’ll contribute to those. But if you look into the details, most companies only scratch the surface.”

Andrea Olivar, Solidaridad’s Global Programme Manager Coffee and contributor to the Coffee Barometer, says the report shows that it’s crucial the industry leaders provide more transparency of their sustainability initiatives.

“We reached the end of the decade with great expectations of progress, but we’re not there yet. It’s clear that companies have made efforts to advance sustainability, and some of them are progressing, but there’s a lot of scattered effort with a small reach,” Olivar says.

“Another important message is that companies have made public commitments regarding sustainability, but somehow, they’re struggling to report on these commitments. They may have achieved them, but it’s not transparent or public. This creates the feeling that no one is doing enough. Is that the case, or are people just not revealing what they actually achieved?”

2023

2022

Credit: Ethos Agriculture

2021

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The report focuses on the efforts of the global industry’s 10 largest roasters – Nestlé, JDE Peets, JM Smucker, Starbucks, Strauss, Lavazza, Melitta, UCC, Tchibo, and Massimo Zanetti – and its five biggest traders – Neumann Kaffee Gruppe, Louis Dreyfus Company, ECOM, Volcafé, and Olam. Panhuysen says this cross-section represents approximately 35 per cent of all coffee roasted and 50 per cent of all coffee traded, and thus, these companies hold a large degree of influence over the market.

“The industry is huge and we could highlight many different aspects of it, but we’ve chosen to focus on the top roasters and traders because they are brands quite well known to the consumers and the rest of the industry,” Panhuysen says.

“There’s also the idea behind it that, if the top roasters and traders are moving in the direction of sustainably produced coffee, the rest of the sector will follow.”

Though the ramifications of COVID-19 are yet to be clear, the Coffee Barometer depicts a clear disparity between the low prices paid to coffee producers and the profitability of coffee consumption. The report estimates this part of the industry to be worth US$55 billion in 2019.

“We still have to wait to see what will happen in the next year. If an economic crisis hits hard, out-of-home consumption might be affected, which relates to a couple of companies we mentioned in the Coffee Barometer. But overall, the coffee sector itself is doing very well on the consumption side,” Panhuysen says.

“On the other hand, the production side of the industry painted a bleak picture even before the pandemic hit, but that’s not a new story.”

For several years already, many coffee producers have struggled with coffee prices

below the cost of production. This has made it more difficult to deal with other challenges, including climate change, pests and disease, or social issues like younger people leaving coffee farming areas.

“A lot of countries were already in a difficult situation and it’s only getting worse.

For example, in Ethiopia, Kenya, and some Central American countries, coffee was already a poverty crop, but now it’s a last resort. You only grow it if you cannot do anything else,” Panhuysen says.

“In Kenya, you can see it around Nairobi, where coffee areas are being converted into golf courses or residential areas, because it’s more profitable to sell your land than continue growing coffee. We’re just at the beginning of it and the sector will see rapid changes in other origins if the profitability for farmers doesn’t increase.”

Olivar says this puts producers under constant pressure to cut costs, especially those related to labour and the environment, or providing for the needs of rural communities.

Sjoerd Panhuysen of Ethos Agriculture is the lead author of the 2020 Coffee Barometer.

Andrea Olivar is the Global Programme Manager Coffee of Solidaridad.

“You have to imagine yourself in a position where your income is too low. If your salary was suddenly cut in half, you’d try to adapt and just cover the basics,” she says.

“Producers often have to pay the costs for sustainability like certifications and voluntary standards. Whether prices are good or bad, farmers are covering those sustainable practices with their own money because they need it for market access.”

Overall, the report says the adoption of voluntary sustainability standards, like Fairtrade and Rainforest Alliance, leads to an increase of coffee price levels, though these are marginal considering the additional costs. Often, coffee produced to those voluntary sustainability standards is not purchased under those certifications, meaning the buyer has not acknowledged or supported the producer’s investment.

The Coffee Barometer says the uptake of certified coffee has only grown slowly, with many

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FEATURE Coffee Barometer

Figure 4:

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Coffee prices have largely declined over the past decade as both production and demand rose.

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Volcafé EDF

ECOM

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OLAM

UCC

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NKG

Tchibo

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LDC

Strauss

ICP/c&c

Starbucks

WCR

Smuckers

SCA

Nestlé

Credit: Ethos Agriculture

CPPTF

Melitta

SAFE

Massimo Zanetti

SCC

Lavazza

GCP

JDE Peet’s

Members of MSIs

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- -

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Each company mentioned in the Coffee Barometer contributes to at least one MSI.

roasters and retailers developing their own sourcing standards in the hope these systems will be more efficient and effective. However, Olivar says this creates issues with accountability.

“We need greater transparency in the coffee value chain. Coffee is quite a traceable product, but we also need to be more transparent of where value is concentrated, so we can see which part of the chain needs intervention,” she says.

“The Coffee Barometer shows what’s happening in the different origins, what percentage of the export price reaches producers and if there’s efficiencies to be made at that stage. It’s not just about price, there are different variables that affect producers’ economic viability. We need to have clarity on what we want to focus on in the next couple of years.”

Many companies publish annual corporate social responsibility or sustainability reports detailing their own voluntary actions. However, Panhuysen says these are often either too

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shallow with little analysis, or are so complex and detailed they’re incomprehensive for the average reader. While compiling the report, the authors reached out to the companies involved for more explicit information and found further challenges to accountability.

“We asked all the companies in the report how much they are investing in their voluntary sustainability efforts. Two of the companies tried to answer, but many just didn’t give insight how much they were actually spending,” Panhuysen says.

“It could be that these costs are considered an everyday expense. The fact that nobody really knows how much money is going into specific types of initiatives is puzzling, and it makes it unclear how they’re reaching their sustainability goals in an efficient manner.”

In 2017, the Sustainable Coffee Challenge (SCC) and Global Coffee Platform (GCP) introduced a Sustainability Framework for the coffee sector, based on the SDGs. Despite a majority of the roasters and traders being members of at least one of these multistakeholder initiatives (MSIs), none of them referred to the Sustainability Framework in their corporate social responsibility reports.

To en ha nce t ra nspa renc y a nd accountability, the Coffee Barometer breaks down the performance of these 15 coffee companies, according to the 15 priority sustainability topics and related SDG goals and targets listed in the Sustainability Framework.

It evaluates the commitments of each company with grades based on reference and contribution to prioritisation and specific goals and measurement of contributions to each SDG. “What we want to see is how the SDGs are integrated in their overall company policy framework and goals over the next couple of years,” Panhuysen says.

“A company might say ‘we’re working on SDG5 – gender equality’ but what does that mean? Often, it’s related to one small, specific project. For instance, ‘we’re doing this project in Rwanda with 40 women’, but if you’re company is buying 10 per cent of all green coffee in the world, it’s clearly not reflected in your policies or in line with your potential impact.”

According to the Coffee Barometer, Olam was the only one of the 15 companies to be adequately explaining its performance

on certain SDG goals. A few others, including Nestlé and Lavazza, were found to have also prioritised specific goals related to SDGs, or integrated certain SDGs comprehensively into their strategy and investment decisions.

“Last year, Olam published a specific strategy outlining what they’re going to do in coffee. That strategy is quite well integrated with a couple of the SDGs they’ve chosen to work on, they’ve set goals that are measurable over time, and they’ve linked it to the bigger policy of the company,” Panhuysen says.

“It’s still a question if they’ll achieve those goals, but at least there’s something to go back to, and create an accountability culture.”

Outside of self-regulation, the Coffee Barometer suggests greater contributions to and support of MSIs could provide greater accountability for the coffee sector. Olivar is a board member of the GCP and is on the advisory council of the SCC. She says these MSIs, and many others, provide an opportunity for industry leaders to collaborate on initiatives.

“We have big issues we cannot resolve by ourselves and MSIs are good avenues to make progress. They create places to work together, where we can solve questions like ‘what is the global agenda?’ And ‘how can we solve these systemic issues affecting the performance of coffee?’” Olivar says. “Before these initiatives, it was rare to see the big companies come together to talk about sustainability. There’s a risk with having these big companies determining the agenda and setting the bar too low, but the role of organisations [like the MSIs] are to push them a little bit further than their comfort zone.”

While sustainability standards are still voluntary to companies for the most part, the Coffee Barometer suggests it will only be a matter of time before this is no longer the case.

“We have to develop interventions that affect the coffee industry beyond a few producers. We have to think about how we can make our supply chains more efficient. And if we are making commitments, we have to report on our progress,” Olivar says.

“The coffee industry has beautiful examples here and there, but on a global level, we haven’t moved from the narrative to the action.

That needs to happen soon.”

The European Commission has committed to proposing legislation on sustainable corporate governance in 2021, including mandatory human rights and environmental due diligence. It is also developing a legislative proposal to prevent market entry of products associated with deforestation or forest degradation.

Individual countries like France, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom have already introduced legislation regarding human rights and deforestation of their own. Panhuysen suggests the incoming Biden government in the United States could have similar intentions regarding human-rights-respecting and deforestation-free commodities.

“The sustainability debate is going into higher gear on the political level. And the expectations of multinationals will be huge,” Panhuysen says. “What we can do together in these MSIs is be prepared for these types of requests, not only because they are requested of us, but because they are necessary as a basis for the prosperity of the coffee sector itself.” G C R The full 2020 Coffee Barometer report is accessible in English, Spanish, and French at www.coffeebarometer.org

THE TRUE VALUE OF COFFEE

THE ICO UNVEILS ITS LATEST COFFEE DEVELOPMENT REPORT ON THE ECONOMIC SUSTAINABILITY, INCLUSIVENESS, AND RESILIENCE OF THE COFFEE GLOBAL VALUE CHAIN IN A YEAR OF UNPRECEDENTED CHALLENGES.

T

he start of a new year marks a renewal of hope and prosperity for the world. In the midst of the unfolding economic recession as a result of the global pandemic and its disruption to coffee supply chains, the International Coffee Organization (ICO) has unveiled its Coffee Development Report (CDR) 2020 as a means to better understand the dynamics and governance of the entire coffee global value chain (C-GVC), its evolution, and provide recommendations for a more sustainable and inclusive sector.

The report, based on sound empirical analysis, was particularly inspired by the seminal World Development Report 2020 of the World Bank, which focuses on understanding the impact of Global Value Chains (GVCs) in the world economy on livelihoods in developing and transition countries.

The ICO team, with the support of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development through the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH prepared this second edition of the flagship publication.

Following the liberalisation of the coffee sector at the national and international levels in the last three decades, trade within the GVC has increased considerably and, similarly to other agricultural and industrial products, the coffee chain is increasingly associated with specialisation and high-efficiency operations, as well as durable and closer relationships between the actors involved.

The new role of lead firms in the C-GVC and their close relationships with suppliers has changed the governance and power balance in the coffee sector. It has opened up new opportunities for coffee growers to upgrade, gain access to the global market, and acquire

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Illustration: ©Blackwood Creative Ltd, all rights reserved.

MARKET REPORT ICO

knowledge and technology to improve quality, sustainability and profitability.

CDR co-author and former ICO senior economist Christoph Saenger stresses the importance of producing a document that was firmly anchored in the global development debate. “We wanted to make sure it’s not only read in coffee circles, but creates attention in the international community to bring awareness to the challenges presented to the sector, and mobilise support,” Saenger told the audience at the CDR virtual lunch.

“What’s interesting, is that we looked at producing and consuming countries together to have [a] complete picture and applied the GVC to the coffee sector, building on the ICO’s statistical data. I think the analysis helps to identify some ‘bright spots’ – sectors that permit GVC participation that enable high income for farmers. Creating the

understanding of the ‘bright spots’ and how to replicate them in other countries is an important first step which will certainly be driven by policy makers, industrial and trade policies, but also financial institutions who will drive that change.”

A key recommendation of the report is that a smart mix of market-driven initiatives and regulatory options, constructive dialogue and joint action between public and private sector stakeholders along with accurate and timely information to facilitate cooperation, are necessary to maximise the economic benefits for coffee farmers integrating the GVC. Rocco Macchiavello, Associate Professor of Management at the London School of Economics who provided critical inputs to the CDR, says Rwanda is one such example where foreign Growth rates of coffee exports at constant value and in volume between 1991 to 1994 and the period between 2015 to investors have been particularly effective at 2018 by coffee form (%). Source: ICO turning under-performing washing stations into high-capacity and efficient facilities that can link producers to high-value coffee markets. quality, and relationships with farmers,” “Rwanda is a country where literally hundreds of washing stations shot up in the last decade, Macchiavello told the audience. and this development has been associated with an increase in quality product. We then saw the One thing to note, Saenger adds, is that emergence of large firms that manage multiple washing stations, and the emergence of foreignnot everyone can participate in such ‘bright owned groups with professional management. This resulted in better efficiency, improved product spots’ that encourage value addition shared

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between multinational and farmers, so we need to make sure we can bring more farmers into such programs. “We need to equip the buyers of coffee through working capital to enable them to extend services to farmers, not only through buying but also providing extension, pre-harvest finance, and so on. I think that is also where multilateral development banks come in [to the picture],” he said.

Another significant example of shared value through partnerships is Colombia. The National Coffee Federation (FNC), the country’s main coffee sector association, supports coffee growers by providing support in research, technical assistance, capacity building and market access. A large majority of small-scale farmers sell their production to the FNC, and purchase guarantees introduced

by FNC bring financial stability to coffee growers. As such, FNC has a key role in linking farmers to large buyers and high-value markets.

The expansion of the coffee GVC is driven by the private sector, but governments need to provide an enabling environment. Higher-income regions such as Europe and North America accounted for more than 96 per cent of roasted coffee exports and 53 per cent of soluble coffee exports in 2018, indicating that processing activities primarily occur in higher-income regions that rely strongly on green coffee imports from the producing lower-income regions.

The report provides also key interesting recommendations to governments on the role they play, both as regulators and as enablers, in creating the right environment, to make the C-GVC not only sustainable but more inclusive to respond to the demand by consumers.

Sebastian Lesch, Head of Division on Sustainable Agricultural Supply Chains, International Agricultural Policy, Agriculture, Innovation, at Germany’s Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), pointed out that the German government and the EU are working on a due diligence process that will enable to increase sustainable production and sourcing of coffee and provide higher opportunities for farmers to integrate the C-GVC and higher income. He also spoke about the imbalances in the value chain and to mitigate them, including the removal of tarrifis and use of blockchain technology.

“Our aim is to bring all sides to the table, put farmer income at the centre of discussions, which is paramount, cover-off differentiation, the effects of climate change, have the private sector on board, and look at transparency in the value chain,” he said.

Other themes in the report highlight the upgrading opportunities for Arabica and Robusta coffee producers, the need for inclusiveness, the coffee GVC’s contribution to the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and on the resilience of the coffee GVC to stressors such as climate change and the current global pandemic. Aoife Hanley, a researcher at the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, says the world is looking for solutions and it is possible to find solutions using the 30 years of ICO data and regression techniques to look for “strong and striking patterns” and see the trajectory of the past to predict the future. “There are some things that can be done to assist the degree of which producing and importing countries can capture more value from green coffee exports,” said Hanley.

Impact channels of COVID-19 in coffee producing countries. Source: Based on World Bank (2014).

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One such suggestion the CDR analysed was international tariffs of industrialisation of origin countries, and whether it helps or hinders these countries.

“Tariffs are always singled out as an important aspect of value creation because they act as severe impediments for growers and producers in many sectors, not just coffee.

Tariffs matter a lot and the good news is they can be changed,” Hanley said.

Functional upgrading of agricultural practices to get goods to ports for sale in producing countries was also considered a key variable to help countries capture more value from the coffee produced, such as the conditions of roads, harbours, and ports that can impact the exporting green coffee.

“The other thing that goes hand in hand is industrial capacity, which can be exploited, and value can be levered from it,” Hanley said.

“There’s a lot of mechanisation involved [in coffee production] so there needs to be some industrial capacity before countries can capture value from produced Arabica or Robusta.

Therefore, we can see if you have a strong and thriving cocoa industry like Ghana and you have the capacity and machinery to deal with that, there’s a big spin-off effect because you can leverage your industrial base. There are some success stories that have managed to do that well, such as Vietnam, Ecuador, and the Philippines, who have been able to create soluble coffees from either cultivated Robustas or imported coffee in the country itself.”

Process upgrading at farm-level and in the roasting industry has led to higher efficiency and productivity. The results are lower costs per unit and increased competitiveness of some green coffee origins. Other key drivers to capture added value are political stability and highly diversified economies, such as resources from extracted industries like crude oil.

“One has to be mindful of the other industries that are active in the economy because they can give or take quite significantly from coffee to capture value,” Hanley said.

“They can make it difficult for coffee growers to employ people at a competitive price because they get attracted to these other industries.”

International trade in coffee has become more complex. Today, more countries are participating in the global trade of coffee compared to 30 years ago. High-income,

non-producing countries have significantly increased exports of coffee. International trade in processed coffee forms, such as roasted and soluble coffee has grown more substantially than that of green coffee. This growth has been mainly driven by a small number of countries that capture a large value share of the GVC. Key findings of the report include that the value of annual cross-border coffee exports (including green, roasted, and soluble) has more than quadrupled from US$8.4 billion in 1991 to US$35.6 billion in 2018 with non-producing countries, including the UK, having played a significant role.

Rebecca Pandolph, Chief of the ICO Statistics section of the report, says a notable feature of the global coffee market is sustained low and volatile prices, which continued into the 2019/20 crop year. However, Pandolph says the period around the time the global pandemic started saw a huge influx of stockpiling and panic-buying, resulting in a surge of demand for imports in March/April 2020. This then flattened out with the ongoing pandemic, price

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fluctuations, global economic downturn, and limited recovery in out-of-home consumption as countrywide social distancing measure remain in place, resulting in an overall decline of global demand by the end of 2020.

“Unlike demand, however, production was not particularly affected, mainly because most coffee was harvested before the start of the pandemic. We expect to see more of an impact in current season 2020/21 with lower yields and quality going down, however governments have taken many measures to keep production and supply up,” she said.

Global coffee trade was mainly impacted by shipment delayers, container availability, and fewer workers in ports, with exports from producing countries falling by 5 per cent to 127 million bags.

For producer countries, their total export earnings in 2019-20 declined by 4 per cent to around US$18 billion, although on a per unit basis, roasted coffee exports saw a significant increase as the average unit value rose to 1.95 US cents per pound.

Coffee year 2019/20 was a year of unprecedented challenges. Global coffee prices have trended downwards since November 2016 when the ICO composite indicator averaged 145.82 US cents per pound. Global output in 2019/20 is estimated at 169.34 million bags, 2.2 per cent lower than in 2018/19, with global coffee consumption estimated to fall by 0.9 per cent to 167.59 million bags.

The coffee sector is highly sensitive to climate variations, but a new threat to the fragility of the C-GCV is the COVID-19 outbreak. Supply chain disruptions triggered by pandemics and health crises, but also by climate change or emergencies, have the potential to severely hamper exports of coffee, thereby affecting foreign exchange earnings and jobs in producing countries, the downstream operators of the GVC, as well as consumers. G C R A hard copy of the Coffee Development Report 2020 can be purchased online at www.internationalcoffeecouncil.com/cdr2020 and is also available to download for free.

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ORIGIN Costa Rica

COSTA RICAN CHARM CENTRAL AMERICA’S OLDEST COFFEE PRODUCING COUNTRY HAS BUILT ITS INDUSTRY ON QUALITY, SUPPORTING PRODUCERS, AND SOCIALLY AND ENVIRONMENTALLY SUSTAINABLE MODELS OF PRODUCTION.

C

offee is one of Costa Rica’s oldest agricultural products, with a history dating back almost 200 years. In the 1820s, the Costa Rican government distributed coffee plants and offered numerous incentives to encourage families to take up coffee farming, creating an industry that, to this day, is still made up of 90 per cent smallholder producers.

Since 1933, the Instituto del Café de Costa Rica (ICAFE) has overseen the country’s coffee industry, aiding its agricultural and economic development. Funded by a 1.5 per cent export tax on all Costa Rican coffee, ICAFE reviews the sale of any and all coffee contracts, making sure producers receive around 80 per cent of the free-on-board price, more than any other producing country in the world can guarantee.

For a long time, coffee was Costa Rica’s number one agricultural export, before being dethroned in the 1990s by bananas – and since

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overtaken by pineapples.

“Pineapples and bananas are grown on big farms by international enterprises, but in coffee, there are a lot of smallholders,” says Max Gurdián of Café Capris, the in-country partner of coffee trader Volcafe.

“Coffee is not as big an agricultural product, but it’s still more important in terms of income distribution. When you talk about coffee, you are talking about almost 30,000 farmers, as well as the 75,000 pickers every year who rely on it.”

According to the United States Development Authority’s Foreign Agricultural Service, Costa Rican coffee production reached 1.47 million

60-kilogram bags in its 2019/2020 crop year. It estimates the 2019/2020 crop year will reach 1.5 million bags.

After the industry-wide coffee price crisis of the early 1990s threatened the crop’s viability in many countries, Gurdián says the industry collaborated to differentiate itself in the market.

“Costa Rica only accounts for about one per cent of world coffee production, so we knew we couldn’t compete on quantity,” he says. “Instead, we decided to compete first and foremost on quality, alongside more sustainable models of production.”

The Specialty Coffee Association of Costa Rica (SCACR) was formed in 1993 to help the industry achieve this goal. Its Executive Director, Noelia Villalobos, tells Global Coffee Report the organisation of stakeholders from along the value chain’s first step was to improve the education available to farmers.

“Twenty years ago, farmers wouldn’t taste their own coffee, they’d just give it to a big mill for processing. We started teaching producers the importance of picking the ripest cherries and tasting or cupping their own coffees so

they could learn what makes a difference,” Villalobos says.

“We also educated millers on protocols and the way to process coffee properly to get the best quality out of it. We introduced a quality certification that a mill could give to its best coffees, but phased it out as the quality had reached the point it would apply to a mill’s entire harvest.”

The SCACR continues to hold regular training sessions for the Costa Rican industry, but its focus is now more on promoting Costa Rican coffee to the global community. The organisation is the in-country coordinator of the Cup of Excellence which showcases its producer’s best coffees and latest innovations.

Villalobos says greater knowledge within the industry has also led to what she calls a “micro mill revolution”, where producers show more interest in vertically integrating their businesses.

“When we started the Cup of Excellence, there was about 20 micro mills, and now, from the 290 plants we have in Costa Rica, they make up more than two-thirds. These are producers who are now also millers and can commercialise or sell their own coffee to exporters. This has helped some families bring back their younger generations who left for the city but are now exposed to a more interesting part of the coffee business,” she says.

“On the other hand, we now have a lot of micro mills producing micro lots. It’s not easy to export just one or two bags of coffee, even if there is demand from small roasters or buyers on the other side. A lot of micro mills appear, but we also see them disappear. There’s been some bad to the trend, but it’s mostly been good because it shows that producers have become more engaged in the industry.”

A REPUTATION TO PROTECT Costa Rica’s unique, quality-drive position in the market may bring many benefits, but Eduardo Gurdián Pacheco, Owner and Manager of Hacienda Pilas farm, says it’s one that’s challenging to maintain.

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ORIGIN Costa Rica

“We receive good prices for Costa Rican coffee, so as coffee growers, we need to defend that.

It’s quite expensive to produce coffee in Costa Rica, so we need to be very productive and it’s difficult to maintain quality at volume. There is also a social and environmental responsibility we hold while maintaining that quality and production,” Pacheco says.

“Labour is very expensive in Costa Rica compared to other Central American countries because we have a lot of ‘social charges’ to that labour, like insurance, health care, and minimum wage. For me, it’s the social responsibility behind our coffee cup that separates us from the rest of the world.”

Labour became an even more pressing issue for the Costa Rican industry in 2020, when COVID-19 forced the country to close its borders. A majority of the country’s pickers during the harvest season are migrants from Nicaragua and Panama – about 40 per cent each – with locals making up the other 20 per cent.

“This last crop season, the pandemic brought many health challenges and has been the most stressful harvest in my life. Hacienda Pilas manages 300 pickers during the harvest season. It’s a lot of people and we need to take care of them,” Pacheco says.

“We worked on the housing to ensure safer conditions and that there weren’t too many people in each house, taught people to wash their hands and use a mask, and to keep their distance during daily work. It was a big challenge last year and we invested a lot, but out of our 300 pickers, I’m proud we had zero cases.”

Hacienda Pilas is located in the West Central Valley, one of Costa Rica’s eight main growing regions. The farm was able to recruit enough Costa Rican pickers due to the increased number of people finding themselves out of work.

“Many people from Costa Rica have become unemployed due to the pandemic, so they’d come Hacienda Pilas recruited 300 pickers during the 2020 harvest, reporting zero cases of COVID-19 among them.

to pick coffee. This year, I’ve had pickers who never picked coffee before, so when they arrived at Hacienda Pilas, they realised it wasn’t as easy as they thought,” Pacheco says.

“I don’t think COVID will end in 2021, so we will face many of the same challenges in 2021.”

Another ongoing concern of Costa Rican producers is climate change. Pacheco says there is a need for producers to make their agricultural systems more resilient to longer dry seasons, warmer climates, and problems with pests while reducing chemical usage.

“When I joined Hacienda Pilas, we only grew Catuai, but now with diseases like leaf rust and larger dry seasons, we need to keep changing and planting new varieties that keep good qualities and are robust against new challenges,” he says.

Max Gurdián says there is also a growing international demand for coffee that is sustainable and organic.

“Over the last few years, more roasters want products that guarantee they are pesticide-free.

That’s a big challenge, because many farmers cannot be completely organic while maintaining the same volume of production,” Gurdián says.

“In our case, we have to work together with farmers to find solutions to produce quality, quantity, and in a safe way.”

He adds that while COVID has impacted demand for the more expensive coffees, like those Costa Rica tends to produce, the country’s reputation has helped it stay afloat.

“When people cut budgets, they start with the ‘fancy’ ingredients, and that’s where Costa Rica sits. Selling the harvest this year was a big challenge for us as exporters,” Gurdián says.

“At the same time, many of our Costa Rican customers want Costa Rica in their blends or single origins, and they’re very loyal to us.”

GREATER APPRECIATION Difficulty in selling or exporting coffee may have also strengthened ties between the country’s producers and roasters. At almost four kilograms per capita, Costa Rica is the second largest consumer of coffee of all producing countries, behind only Brazil.

Usually, this means the country’s roasters are required to import coffee from Nicaragua and Honduras to meet demand, while Costa Rica’s highest quality coffees are sent overseas for a higher price. SCACR’s Villalobos says coffee is ingrained in Costa Rican culture.

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“Many people grew up in between coffee plantations – our school year is even based around the harvest cycle,” Villalobos says.

“Part of what the SCACR does now is run courses for baristas, roasters, coffee cuppers, or for people that just love coffee. Now, a specialty coffee community has grown and you can find a lot of coffee shops in San José and other cities, as well as a lot of coffee schools.”

Villalobos says ICAFE is utilising the connectivity of the Costa Rican coffee community with the development of an app that will provide a traceable view of the supply chain to both producers and consumers.

ICAFE has overseen the development of “We have eight growing regions with a lot Costa Rica’s coffee industry since 1933. of different microclimates that create different flavour profiles. But to me, the added value of Costa Rican coffee is the added value of ensuring the producer is getting a fair price,” Villalobos says.

“ICAFE’s traceability and sustainability statement Collects and transparently communicates strategic information along the coffee value chain of Café de Costa Rica, to achieve a greater sustainability for the entire coffee sector.”

Gurdián agrees Costa Rican coffee has a flavour unique to its terroir, however, this is not what separates it from other on the market.

“As an exporter, I cup coffee every day, from every place around the world, and there are

many good coffees that are unique to the area where they are produced. What makes Costa Rica really good is the consistency of its quality,” Gurdián says.

“If someone buys coffee from Costa Rica, we are able to reliably deliver the same quality every year.” G C R

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PROFILE Cama

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Be better, be different CAMA GROUP DISCUSSES THE FAST CHANGING PACKAGING MARKET, AND WHY INNOVATION AND FLEXIBILITY ARE KEY TO DIFFERENTIATING IN A COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE.

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ast year presented huge challenges for the global coffee market, but what it also revealed is new opportunities for growth as a result of consumer drinking habits that have the potential to be long-lasting.

To address some of these prospects and challenges, packaging and turnkey systems specialist Cama Group held a roundtable discussion in January on the topic, ‘What’s brewing in the coffee industry?’, inviting some of its global customers to share their learnings from the past year and how they plan to evolve to meet consumer demand.

Marco Ciaramelli, Chief Executive Officer of Beyers Koffie, a leading private label specialist for the European market, says the key word for his business is going to be “premiumisation”.

“There’s a need for our customers to differentiate from each other to distinguish themselves, and COVID has accelerated this process. The evolution in terms of spending is changing, and the ability to enjoy a premium coffee at home is becoming affordable,” he says. “The challenge for us is the speed of change, innovation and flexibility that is required. We really need to follow the market which is evolving quickly.”

Andy Fawkes, Managing Director of Masteroast Coffee in United Kingdom also shares the pressure of premiumisation. He says the industry is in a “very interesting place” with consumers steering away from soluble products to single serve options. “[Single serve coffee was] once considered an ancillary product for particularly high-end hotels and has now become a major income driver in the retail and ecommerce space, with consumers on a journey of discovery for freshly roasted ground coffee that is accelerating fast in the marketplace,” Fawkes says.

“Coffee bags have really become a UK phenomenon. We were behind that development three to four years ago, which we initially drove in the food sector, but it’s also become a discovery platform for desirable home consumers as they move away from soluble coffee to freshly ground coffee.

“The level of interest in single [serve] continues to astound us, and we’ve had to invest heavily to keep up with demand. Single serve and coffee bags are an easy, low cost platform, which made up 10 to 15 per cent of our overall volumes last year, and which we anticipate will account for 30 to 40 per

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cent of our volume this year. People are looking for quality products in all sectors of the market.”

Such demand has also meant working with customers and their ecommerce platforms to necessitate new levels of bulk packs, letterboxfriendly cartons, and cost-effective weight formats that take advantage of travel and transport changes. Cama Group is already putting Jamaica Blue, Kopi Luwak, and Geishas in capsule format.

As such, Masteroast Coffee works with Cama to apply flexible, short-run technology to its packaging lines with the ability to produce high quality products in multi formats to allow its customers to differentiate in a growing mass market.

“A lot of the move towards premiumisation has demanded hand-packed products, designed to look like an artisan product that is professional and high quality but automated to volume and economy settings. We’re excited about this trend. There is also demand for smaller specialty runs rather chasing the economies of automation. Environmentally, it makes sense to be more productive, using less energy, but consumers are moving in the other direction and that will be the challenge.”

Mark Modenbach, VP of Manufacturing at Pod Pack International, a United Statesbased company for the private label sector, has experienced a loss of opportunity in the hotel and office sector. However, he says extreme growth of single serve over the last several years in addition to retail products has been a welcome shift thanks to the global pandemic forcing more people at home. Modenback says Pod Pack International has had to shift how it responds internally to the demands of different formats and adjust equipment accordingly.

“The consumer is willing to pay for convenience. As their taste changes, they also start looking to be eco-friendly in the products hey use. Therefore, we need equipment that can handle our capacity with good quality, high production, and still keep up with demand with what’s new and emerging to give the consumer what they want, yet in a sustainable way,” Modenbach says.

Cama Group supports customers with a broad range of packaging formats, including capsule configurations.

As such, companies like Pod Pack International and Beyers Koffie are looking into the use of new packaging materials.

“I think the key words in the future are ‘green and sustainable’. In fact, they are already the key words and it’s becoming crucial for our customers and for us, to offer these solutions,” Ciaramelli says.

“I think what’s also going to change is the concept of how information will go out to the consumer. We are currently working on client blockchain technology to trace coffee, a path to give added value to the concept of green and sustainability which can trace [a cup of coffee] back to the origin country. [The consumer] will get input on what’s happening in the chain and the possibility to influence what’s happening. I think the evolution is really going in that direction, and that’s why a company like ours needs to evolve.”

Alessandro Rocca, Sales Engineering Director of Cama Group says it’s no secret that many customers are moving away from plastic to carton packaging options. To reflect this demand, Cama Group has a packaging department dedicated to creating different products and is ready to deliver on sustainable packaging options.

These options are also on the agenda for Masteroast Coffee over the next two years. Fawkes says his company’s sustainable solution will be focused on offering lower food miles with slightly larger, greener pack formats for the B2C market. The company is also creating a high tech delivery fulfilment centre that can hold stock and complete fulfilment needs for customers in the B2B and B2C market through Application Programming Interface technology.

“Our branded customers will have access to a link, for example, which will connect direct to our warehouse, straight to a handheld data reader, pick the desired product and ship it the same day. The warehouse will take 2500 pallets purely to cope with demand,” Fawkes says. “The key is to deliver products to customers promptly, swiftly, and to take out the customer need for gathering inventory. This is really exciting for us.”

Another crucial element to the Masteroast Coffee plant and its level of flexibility on production efficiency is the support of suppliers for the installation of new lines and technology.

For this reason, Cama Group’s Rocca recommends Cama’s top loading and side loading technology. Top loading is great for flexibility to suit medium-to-high-speed lines with the option of several different packaging styles, in addition to the nested approach which is so commonly used. One example, Rocca says, is the ability to arrange capsules in a flower-type format, with four capsules face downwards and two face up. “It’s complex to realise but we have the technology that allowed us to achieve it,” he says.

Side loading is for faster capability but offers less flexibility in carton size and shapes. In one of Cama Group’s latest applications, it can package 1500 capsules per minute across two lanes.

“The major trends we’re seeing in terms of technology demand is customers wanting different format figurations to increase their output, followed by speed and flexibility,” Rocca says.

Of all the industries Cama Group serves, Rocca says coffee is the most dynamic in terms of product types, delivery and vending formats, and packaging styles, of which it supplies secondary and tertiary packaging equipment.

“We are excited by our industry 4.0 package, which customers will have the possibility to install on their Cama systems, with devices to measure energy consumption, and apply augmented reality and virtual reality by means of a tablet on front of the machine, in addition to more focus on maintenance and training,” Rocca says.

“Packaging in coffee is always on the go.

We have a few challenges at this time, but we always work with our engineering department to discover new ways to address our customer needs, and we’re ready to do that.” G C R For more information, visit www.camagroup.com

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PROFILE Cafetto

Korean calling ASPEN KOREA TALKS ABOUT INDUCTING GLOBAL CLEANING SOLUTION SPECIALIST CAFETTO INTO THE KOREAN MARKET AND THE THRIVING CULTURE THAT’S ALREADY PUT BARISTA TALENT AND AUTOMATION ON THE WORLD MAP.

Cafetto Managing Director Christopher Short with Aspen Korea CEO HJ Kwon.

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he Korean coffee market is credited with producing some of the best barista talent on the competition circuit, including 2019 World Barista Champion Joo Yeon Jeon. It is also said to have more coffee shops in the country than McDonalds has stores worldwide, proving coffee culture is well and truly embedded in the Korean way of life.

Since its establishment in 1998, Aspen Korea has been committed to nurturing its growth as the exclusive distributor of brands and products for Korean coffee businesses in the B2B and B2C marketplace, including franchises, online retail orders, and offline distribution channels. The Gangnam-based company takes a ‘total service system’ approach to business, ensuring the quality of its hardware, software, training, and ingredients are at the highest level.

As such, Aspen is committed to exclusive import contracts from around the world to ensure it secures full sales rights in the Korean market, and that its customers can access products from reputable brands and companies at a reasonable price.

“This approach helps Aspen’s reputation by raising awareness of each brand through exclusive purchasing and providing services that match it,” says Aspen Korea Purchasing Manager Daniel Byun.

“Through cooperation with the world’s highest-quality brands, Aspen is continuously developing new products and updating the latest trends in the Korean market.”

One such partnership that has endured nine years of commitment is Aspen’s distribution of Cafetto cleaning products to the Korean market.

Aspen CEO HJ Kwon first met Cafetto Managing Director Christopher Short at an industry tradeshow 15 years ago. They met again in 2012 at a Korean coffee expo and

started discussing plans for Aspen to become a distributor of Cafetto products. At that point, Aspen wasn’t even distributing coffee machines, but committed to the relationship and friendship with the goal to grow its business and Cafetto’s presence in the Korean market, which it did rapidly.

“When we first started our partnership with Cafetto, cleaning products and solutions were still an unexplored market in Korea, but it has grown each year since we’ve been trading with Cafetto. This relationship has allowed us to gain the upper hand in the coffee sanitisation market that will continue to grow in the future,” Byun says.

In the early years of Aspen’s relationship with Cafetto, Byun says it was an educational learning experience to understand just how much coffee machines and equipment needed cleaning attention.

“It was surprising how much cleaning coffee machines frequently affects the taste of coffee. I now communicate that message to those around me and explain the importance of regular cleaning to maintain and enhance the natural flavour of coffee,” he says.

Aspen has communicated and demonstrated this message to customers over the years at tradeshows, exhibitions, and through online and offline channels to help more people pay attention to the importance of machine cleaning. It has even distributed Korean versions of brochures and samples of Cafetto cleaning products to give customers a first-hand demonstration of how effective the products are.

“We’re maintaining remarkable growth every year. The number of online and offline channels and franchises selling Cafetto products through Aspen is increasing. We are also releasing exclusive cleaning products through partnerships with machine manufacturers and are focusing on securing individual store distribution of Cafetto products through continuous promotion,” Byun says.

Cafetto has been a strong supporter of the Korean coffee community since its entry to the market in 2012. So much so, that the Australian-based company sponsored the 2017 World Barista Championship in Seoul, South Korea. It organised a Barista Base Camp at Ediya Coffee Lab’s flagship coffee lab in Gangnam for all competing baristas to hang out before the competition. To this day, the camp remains

one of the best Cafetto ever organised. Thanks to Ediya Coffee Lab, all competing baristas enjoyed coffee, bakeries, and a relaxed environment.

In addition to supporting Korea’s barista talent, Cafetto, with assistance from Aspen, developed custom-made products so that Aspen could meet all regulatory and compliance standards in supplying high quality cleaning products that are most suitable for Korean market. The non-corrosive formula, suitable for Korean FDA regulations, can be used on semi-automatic machines, parts of automatic espresso machines, and on milk liners, frothers, even blender containers and ice machines.

Aspen is proud to work with Cafetto and validate its purpose in the Korean market because of its commitment to developing eco-friendly and premium quality cleaning solutions, how effective they are, how quick they achieve results, and how diverse the product range is to suit all cleaning solution needs in the coffee market.

“I think our relationship is a perfect partnership because Cafetto always listens to Aspen’s feedback and helps resolves any questions we have quickly,” Byun says.

In the past, he says semi-automatic coffee machines would dominate mainstream coffee shops, but more recently, fully automatics and even robots have emerged on the market, demonstrating the country’s penchant for automation.

“Due to labour costs and the coronavirus pandemic, there is a clear tendency to prefer automatic machines to semi-automatic. But since the low-priced coffee and high-priced coffee markets coexist, various types of coffee machines will continue to be used across the market,” he says.

Regardless of the equipment in use, Cafetto has a cleaning solution to meet every customer demand, and together with Aspen, will continue to be pillar of support to the extended Korean coffee community.

In Aspen’s 23-year-history, the company is excited to grow its presence in the B2B and B2C market, and continue to build its brand awareness in Korea, with Cafetto by its side. G C R For more information, visit www.aspenkorea.com and www.cafetto.com Aspen Korea CEO HJ Kwon has been importing Cafetto products to Korea since 2012.

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PROFILE Ima Coffee

SERVICE WITH A SMILE SMILE BEVERAGE WERKS IN THE UNITED STATES HAS BROUGHT ITS SUSTAINABLE SINGLE SERVE SOLUTIONS TO THE MARKET, WITH ASSISTANCE FROM IMA COFFEE.

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ustainability is becoming less of an option and more of a requirement of businesses Smile Beverage Werks is a Benefit “B” in the coffee industry. This is especially true in the single serve market, where the Corporation aiming to make single serve coffee plastic waste and environmental footprint is most visible to the end consumer. more sustainable.

Ima Coffee, consisting of Ima Coffee Packaging and roasting arm Ima Coffee “[Our] mission is to make responsibly Petroncini, is committed to playing its part in helping coffee businesses improve sourced, exceptional coffees in the most the sustainability of their single serve products. Ima has created this Coffee Hub to environmentally friendly coffee capsules for leverage its expertise at every step of coffee processing and packaging and serve the coffee industry our own brand, Smile Coffee Werks, and for from A to Z as a one-stop answer to large and small coffee producers worldwide. private label customers,” says Michael Sands, Alessandro Nobili, Project & Product Management Manager of Ima Coffee, says this approach CO-founder and CEO of Smile Beverage Werks. ensures market-leading competencies, industry experience, and application-specific know-how However, compostable coffee capsules have encompassing all stages of coffee handling, processing and packaging. traditionally experienced issues preserving the “Ima’s objective is to collaborate with companies and multinationals that want to freshness of coffee or maintaining handle different types of products with less impact on the environment,” Nobili says. their structural integrity.

“As an automatic machine manufacturer, what we do to contribute towards Refusing to sustainability is reduce the impact our equipment has on the environment, and help customers develop new sustainable products.”

Nobili says recent developments in the materials used to produce compostable coffee capsules have made them a more practical option for many businesses, who in the past were deterred by their short shelf life.

“The material used for compostable capsules has improved in the last year in response to increasing demand for more sustainability. This has made it a little easier for us than in the past to handle these materials,” he says.

A recent project of Ima Coffee Packaging was providing a filling and sealing machine for compostable coffee capsules to American start-up Smile Beverage Werks.

“We were very excited to work with a start-up company that was really valuing and Smile Beverage Werks produces championing sustainability,” Nobili says. compostable coffee capsules.

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compromise on quality, Smile Beverage Werks sought out material and equipment suppliers that could bring its vision to life.

Sands says what they were looking for in a partner included pragmatic research and development (R&D) proof of concepts, the ability to adapt quickly and recommend and implement changes, and fast commercialisation.

The equipment itself required an output of at least 400 capsules per minute. “[Our goal was] to get to market quickly on a commercial scale with a new environmentally friendly capsule technology,” Sands says.

“We chose Ima [Coffee Packaging as our equipment partner,] based on their industry reputation for quality, their R&D capabilities, and their insights to support the emerging sustainability market.”

Ima was able to succeed the requirements of Smile Beverage Werks, with its Smile Coffee Werks brand reaching the market in September 2020. It added Keurig compatible products to its line-up later that year. Sands says these are the ‘first-of-their-kind’ compostable coffee capsules made from renewable raw materials with a 12-months-plus shelf life.

“Ima quickly figured out changes to the machinery needed in order to make the technology work,” Sands says.

“They worked closely with us to find all technical solutions so that we can run on a well-known and regarded industry machine at output levels that support industry standards and economics.”

To achieve this, Ima Coffee needs to make sure its equipment can process the material the capsules are made of, which requires cooperation with the capsule and material suppliers.

Nobili says Ima Coffee has purposefully built strong relationships with material and capsule suppliers around the world for this exact reason. In fact, he says there were several material suppliers involved in this project that recommended Ima Coffee Packaging to Smile Beverage Werks.

“Ima Coffee’s R&D lab was able to help Smile Beverage Werks find the right setup, make small changes to the product with the capsule and material suppliers, and adjust or modify our machines in order to be adapted or arranged for this type of product,” Nobili says.

“Our machines are designed to handle all types of products, not just plastic and aluminium.

They are already capable of filling and sealing most capsules, but we can work upstream with the capsule and material suppliers to modify the material or machinery as needed. It’s really a loop that we try to close by working with these suppliers.”

For Smile Beverage Werks, Ima Coffee Packaging applied an ultrasonic sealing process that’s more flexible than thermal heating for this type of compostable product it wanted to produce.”

For Smile Beverage Werks’ facility, Ima supplied its high-speed 595 capsule filling and sealing machine. Capable of filling and sealing 450 capsules per minute, Nobili says the 595 could theoretically process 120 to 130 million capsules per year.

The machine’s modular design allows for a variety of sealing systems for different capsule types, materials, and dosed products. The machine also handles inner components to be placed and sealed inside the capsule before dosing, such as plastic filters, paper filters, and bottom lids.

“We provided our best solution in terms of technology to Smile Beverage Werks, the ‘top gun’ as we like to say,” Nobili says.

“Feedback from Smile Beverage Werks on the 595 was very positive along the development process.

The factory acceptance test we performed on Bologna, Italy, achieved very good results in terms of efficiency and capsule quality.”

Despite its European origins, Ima has built a strong presence in North America, with customers across the United States as well as Canada. Nobili says this is an important market for the coffee industry, where Ima Coffee stands out for offering a turnkey solution, from green bean intake through to cartoning.

“When we meet with a customer, we start with a lot of discussion to understand their needs.

Then, we’re alongside them through the project development. Luckily for us, we have a laboratory in our headquarters where we can test different materials and products they might be considering,” Nobili says.

“In some cases, this is their first coffee project and they are new to the market, so we offer them help with our decades of expertise and experience.”

Ima will continue working with Smile Beverage Werks as the start-up grows and expands. Sands believes demand for sustainable single serve products will only increase and Smile Beverage Werks is ready to meet that demand.

“We expect this category to grow fast with additional capacity to be added and new packaging options to help disrupt and grow the 15 billion annual North American coffee capsule market,” Sands says. G C R For more information, visit www.smilecoffeewerks.com or www.coffee.ima.it

Ima Coffee Packaging works with material suppliers to ensure its technology is tailored to upcoming market trends.

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FEATURE RE-Coffee

The cherry on top A NEW METHOD OF CONTINUOUS COFFEE CHERRY PROCESSING COULD CONTRIBUTE TO SUSTAINABILITY AND THE VALUE CHAIN AT ORIGIN, WHILE OPENING A NEW MARKET TO COFFEE RETAILERS.

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offee is a complex product, and in the traditional process, much is lost on the journey from farm to cup. A small amount of the pulp and skin that covers the beans in the coffee cherry fruit is dried and used for cascara tea, but most is discarded. Most of the antioxidants and other valuable components are lost in the drying and roasting process.

But this is not a problem unique to coffee. Roland Laux has decades of experience in the food and beverage industry. Over that time, he saw how much value was lost getting product to the end consumer and set out to change that.

“Our vision is to bring more of the good of the raw materials into the final product,” Laux says.

“Naturalness is one of the big trends in food and beverage. We observe this in the coffee industry, where people wanting new taste experiences and naturally intrinsic functionality.”

One such project of Laux’s food innovation firm Unico-first, involved developing a new processing method for chocolate with Prof Tilo Hühn of the Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW).

The team processed milled raw cocoa nibs into water, creating a “mousse-like” chocolate slurry, which was then run through a decanter to separate the cocoa into its solid, liquid, and oil phases.

Using this method, Laux says the naturally sweet components of the cocoa fruit could even replace some of the sugar usually added to chocolate.

RE-Coffee developed a new method for processing coffee cherries based on its Spin Cold Brew method.

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“We don’t bring any heat into the process, which allows the original aroma composition of the green cocoa to carry through into the final product. It’s 80 per cent dark chocolate, but it doesn’t taste bitter. Instead, it’s fruity, flowery, much more complex,” Laux says.

Laux sold the cocoa patents and the investor has built a factory in Switzerland that will start market production this year. It wasn’t long before Laux and his team started thinking about how this process could be applied to a similar product: coffee.

“Coffee has so many beautiful things inside it – natural, intrinsic benefits we want to leverage with this method,” Laux says.

“We founded the company Mastercoldbrewer, filed several patents in 2017 and started industrial production of RE-Coffee, cold brew processing of lightly roasted coffee beans, in 2019. Compared to the standard method, we extract more aroma and at the same time reduce processing time from many hours to only minutes. But there is another application of this technology we’ve been excited to explore, coffee cherry processing.”

Using the Continuous Coffee Cherry process, instead of separating the pulp and skin from the beans, freshly harvested, undried and unfermented whole coffee cherries are wet milled with cold water. Phase separation through the decanter then results in three different coffee fruit extracts: a beverage, an oil, and (once dried) a powder.

This is a similar process to how RE-Coffee produces its ready to drink cold brew, except this beverage is prepared with light roasted

Continuous Coffee Cherry processing makes use of the full coffee cherry.

coffee beans instead of fresh cherries.

“Traditionally, there’s a lot of waste in coffee production because the goal of the coffee cherry is the coffee bean, which is exploited and leveraged. But mostly the rest is just thrown away,” Laux says.

“It’s been quite interesting to dive more into the coffee cherry fruit, which many people don’t even know exists.”

Of particular interest to Laux is the high antioxidant content of the coffee fruit and other bioactive compounds such as polyphenols and chlorogenic acid, which he says far outweigh other “superfoods” like acai.

“Not drying the coffee cherry leverages the antiox-level to its maximum potential,” Laux says.

“The health benefits of antioxidant-rich foods are becoming more and more recognised and consumers are seeking products out for their antioxidant power. Acai is hyped for its health benefits all over the world, but we have

something in coffee that’s apparently better, but people just throw it away.”

Once the Continuous Coffee Cherry process is at the industrial stage, decanters will be set up on the farm so cherries can be processed within hours of picking. In the meantime, Laux and his team rely on imported frozen coffee cherries to develop the concept.

“When we came up with this idea in 2017, we needed 20 kilograms of freshly harvested coffee cherries for initial trials. We flew to Gran Canaria [Spain], said to have the only coffee plants in Europe, and picked cherries ourselves, froze them, and brought them home in our luggage,” Laux says.

“We’ve since found suppliers in Guatemala who are able to send us organic coffee cherries they’ve frozen right after harvest.

But this wouldn’t be a sustainable way of doing business, so when we take this project to the industrial level, it will be important we install the equipment at origin.”

Continuous Coffee Cherry processing offers the potential to add value to the When Laux presented the Continuous Coffee Cherry process supply side of the coffee chain. to members of the coffee industry, he says many responded to its potential to add value at the supply side of the value chain.

“Farmers are struggling with low prices, and the way the industry’s going now cannot go on forever,” Laux says.

“Processing freshly harvested cherries onsite would boost the part of the value chain at origin.

That’s how the coffee industry can build a healthy system for the future and pay people a decent price.”

Laux says the coffee fruit oil this process produces has applications in nutraceuticals or cosmetics, where antioxidant-rich products are valued for their anti-ageing properties. Meanwhile, the beverage solution is very customisable and could offer many possibilities to a retailer.

“Coffee cherries can be very different to one another. Some have more pulp than others, some are sweeter, some are more like tea with notes of cherry, raisins, and caramel. There’s a huge range of complex aroma compositions, which is interesting for beverages,” Laux says.

“Another option is to enter roasted beans into the system alongside coffee cherries to bring in typical coffee notes. It all depends on the goal – do we want a beverage that tastes like coffee, or do we want a totally different, fruity, almost tea-like taste profile?”

The coffee fruit powder produced through Continuous Coffee Cherry processing can be used as an ingredient in other drinks, supplements, or products. It can also be added back into the process to produce a beverage with a higher yield. Other ingredients, like milk, spices, or fruit, can be also be introduced during the extraction process to create new, complex flavours.

The products Continuous Coffee Cherry processing can produce may be very different to how consumers typically think of coffee, but Laux says there is room for a market to develop a new type of coffee.

“This beverage wouldn’t be in competition to hot coffee and for many companies would mean entering a totally new or different market. The coffee cherry-derived product business will grow in the future, and we’re already starting to see that with products like cascara,” Laux says.

“Even larger beverage companies that don’t traditionally focus on coffee, like of PepsiCo and Coca-Cola, could embrace this method. They’re looking for healthy, refreshing beverages that embrace sustainability and appeal to millennials.”

With the Continuous Coffee Cherry processing just getting patented and nearing the industrial stage, Laux is excited to see the global beverage industry embrace these trends.

“We’ve had success with this technology in many industries, from chocolate through to wine, fruit, spice and cold brew coffee, and believe the same can happen in coffee cherry,” he says.

“There’s still a lot of education that has to be done regarding the coffee cherry and the public, but there is great potential in leveraging the natural beauty of the whole fruit.” G C R For more information, visit re-coffee.ch/en

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SOLUBLE FEATURE BUENCAFÉ

Instant achievement BUENCAFÉ REACHED NEW HEIGHTS IN 2020 THANKS TO A FOCUS ON QUALITY IN THE INSTANT COFFEE MARKET AND ITS SENSORIA BY BUENCAFÉ TECHNOLOGY CONCEPT.

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uencafé is owned by Colombian coffee producers. All of the soluble coffee plant’s their loyalty,” she says. profits are reinvested into improving coffee growers’ quality of life, sustainability Buencafé’s ability to adapt was put to the of the coffee sector, and the Colombian coffee culture. test at the start of 2020, when the onset of “As a factory, we focus on quality and improving processes, but as a part of the COVID-19 restrictions saw many customers Colombian Coffee Growers Federation (FNC), we do the best for our owners, the need to make sudden changes to their orders. coffee growers. When we improve our technology or products, it’s so we can add “It was important we be very agile and value for coffee farmers,” says Buencafé General Manager Cristina Madriñan. flexible. If a customer had to postpone orders, “Buencafé has an R&D team that continuously seeks out new products… Our pilot plant allows we allowed them to. If another required higher us to experiment and develop prototypes very fast, making the developing process a flexible and volumes, we applied our full capacity to give very customisable experience.”

Since opening its factory doors in 1973, Buencafé has continued to Cristina Madriñan is the General Manager of Buencafé. expand its range of coffee products, which includes freeze-dried soluble coffee, micro-ground options, and coffee extract, as well as fully customisable private-label services.

It’s also focused on improving its own equipment and operations, reaching new heights in 2019 with the roll out of Sensoria by Buencafé technology.

The concept unites a suite of technologies and processes which Buencafé has sourced from around the world to best preserve the complex flavours and aromas of freshly roasted coffee.

“It begins with a unique roasting process in which we unlock the delicate, volatile flavour compounds that are responsible for the aroma and taste of the coffee. Thanks to Sensoria by Buencafé technology, we are able to capture and return those compounds at the right time, avoiding losing them and maintaining distinct and complex flavour profiles intact,” Madriñan says.

“We combine this with the Colombian raw material, the richest coffee in the world, which allows us to achieve an instant coffee with a cupping profile that is very difficult to distinguish from roasted coffee.”

Madriñan says Sensoria by Buencafé technology resulted in an immediate reaction from Buencafé’s customers, some of whom called it a “game changer” for the industry.

“The first feedback we received from people was a surprise, because it’s a new category of quality in the instant market that didn’t exist before,” she says.

“Sensoria by Buencafé technology has also allowed us to better customise our process to what the customer wants and needs. The market is changing quickly, so it’s become important for us to be able to adapt and respond to new requirements.”

Madriñan adds this focus on customisation is important because, over the years, customers have moved from just needing a coffee solution to a yearning for a true “coffee experience” for their businesses.

“This is when flexibility and customisation become true added value to our product offering, bringing us even closer to our customers to earn

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SOLUBLE FEATURE BUENCAFÉ

them what they needed,” Madriñan says.

“Last year was a challenging year for all, but being close to our clients, understanding and supporting their needs, led us to increase our sales, driven specially by a higher demand of retailers in America and a good performance of the ingredients business in Asia.”

Buencafé reported its strongest sales results ever in 2020, with sales above US$160 million, up 9 per cent versus 2019.

With COVID-19 seeing a shift to remote work for many people around the world, at-home coffee consumption has never been more in the spotlight. Madriñan says while the places where people consume coffee are changing, so are the expectations of coffee in those locations.

“Instant is the king of coffee at home. People want easy, convenient, and practical solutions, but they don’t want to sacrifice on quality anymore. That’s something we can take advantage of,” she says.

“People are experimenting with new, increasingly premium products. And in line with the search for better quality, Buencafé launched a new line of products made through its Sensoria by Buencafé technology, which preserves the most delicate flavour and aroma of fresh Colombian coffee, without losing the convenience of an instant soluble.”

Madriñan adds that many of Buencafé’s customers were also able to quickly adapt to the new landscape, having already jumped on market trends that were accelerated due to COVID-19.

“Our North American customers grew very fast this year. They already had established ecommerce channels, which I think made it easier for them to respond to the new reality,” she says. “The pandemic decisively accelerated the use of digital platforms and e-commerce, which are now a priority for leading companies and brands. In 2021, online sales will continue reaching new devotees, and the industry must get ready and transform rapidly.

“Our coffee extract business also grew, because it’s primary market in Asia was able to manage the COVID situation better than many other countries and regions.”

While instant coffee is the lion’s share of Buencafé’s portfolio, the factory also produces coffee extract with a diverse array of uses. These range from ready to drink (RTD) coffees and beverages to ice creams, candies, baked items, and liqueurs.

“RTD is very popular in Asia, but it is also growing in the United States, and the US is like a reference point for trends that will soon spread to other markets,” Madriñan says.

Another aspect of Buencafé’s business reinforced by the pandemic was its private label services, where Madriñan says smaller and cheaper brands are filling a new need in the market.

“Private labels have reinvented themselves during the pandemic and shown competitive strength, becoming very attractive options for consumers whose income was hit,” she says.

“Private labels are one of Buencafé’s main businesses and we support our customers by offering timely delivery and availability of all our installed capacity. In 2021, we will continue strengthening innovation in labels, packaging, and products.”

However, not every industry trend of 2020 is directly related to COVID-19. Issues like sustainability have become increasingly pressing year on year, and Madriñan says this is where Buencafé’s connection to producers comes to the forefront.

“Consumers are increasingly conscious, responsible, and interested in sustainability and traceability. Quality is just one part of what we offer to our customers. There’s sustainable value, because we are the only instant coffee company in the world that invests 100 per cent of profits back into coffee growers,” she says.

“It’s not just social or economic, it’s a combination of many elements. As part of the FNC, we’re

“PEOPLE WANT EASY, CONVENIENT, AND PRACTICAL SOLUTIONS, BUT THEY DON’T WANT TO SACRIFICE ON QUALITY ANYMORE. THAT’S SOMETHING WE CAN TAKE ADVANTAGE OF.” Christina Madriñan

Buencafé General Manager Buencafé reported its strongest sales results ever in 2020, with sales above US$160 million, up 9 per cent versus 2019.

also involved in promoting environmental best practices.”

With consumer used to higher quality coffee experiences at home – like Sensoria provides – and lasting societal changes from the pandemic, Madriñan sees a positive future for the instant coffee market, Buencafé, and the Colombian producers that own it.

“These trends will continue as recover from COVID. They might not grow at the same rate as in 2020, but these seeds have been planted and will flourish in the coming years.” G C R For more information, visit www.buencafe.com/en

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SOLUBLE FEATURE FLAVOURTECH

RTD made easy AROMA RECOVERY AND EXTRACTION SPECIALIST FLAVOURTECH ON SHIFTING THE QUALITY PERSPECTIVE OF READY TO DRINK AND SOLUBLE COFFEE, AND WHY ITS INTEGRATED EXTRACTION SYSTEM IS BEST POSITIONED TO PRESERVE THE AROMAS OF TEA AND COFFEE.

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n the early 90s when Ready to drink (RTD) beverages were making their impression on the global market, a major Japanese manufacturer approached global technology manufacturer Flavourtech as to how it could automate its processes.

At the time, the number seventh ranked company in terms of market share in Japan invited Flavourtech to its factory. It observed organised variables in every direction: numerous tanks, continuous people movement, forklifts darting around the production floor, and a liquid substance moved from here, there, and everywhere.

This visit was the inspiration Flavourtech needed to devise a streamlined system that could automate the RTD process, while developing a way to extract the best flavours possible and deliver a quality end product.

The result was Flavourtech’s Integrated Extraction System (IES), a continuous, automated processing line that allows customers to produce premium aromas, extracts, and concentrates for RTD coffee and tea products, as well as soluble coffee and flavour industries.

“We developed the IES with these particular customers in mind. At the same time, other companies around the world were looking to automate the traditional batch process to create RTD solutions, done by grinding coffee or mixing tea manually with water, but we knew we would make an imprint with our IES,” says Flavourtech Global Sales Manager Paul Ahn. “That original customer in Japan is now a market leader in the RTD market space.”

An installation of Flavourtech’s modular Integrated Extraction System.

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The IES is built as a modular system. It can be inserted into existing process lines as required to make gradual improvements or installed in its entirety to form a continuous process line, allowing aroma recovery, extraction, and concentration in one simple-to-operate system.

The IES feeds the raw material, such as roasted coffee beans or tea leaves, into the milling and extraction system. The materials undergo milling in a blanket of water to capture the light, floral, and fruity characteristics of beans or tea, typically lost in traditional methods of RTD or soluble manufacturing.

The stream of water then gently carries the flavour notes into Flavourtech’s flagship product, the Spinning Cone Column (SCC).

The SCC extracts, captures, and protects the natural aromas and volatile compounds using

SOLUBLE FEATURE FLAVOURTECH

A schematic of Flavourtech’s typical Integrated Extraction System processing line.

steam at a low temperature of around 100°C in just 25 seconds. This shorter residence time differs dramatically from that used in traditional extraction techniques.

Flavourtech’s Rotating Disc Column, or RDC, can be inserted into the IES for soluble coffee production, allowing a continuous flow of coffee slurry for high temperature extraction. The slurry is exposed to temperatures of between 150° to 180°C for just 20 minutes to enable further hydrolysis to take place. The end result is a premium RTD or soluble product in terms of quality and enhanced aroma at the end of the line. In a traditional process, extraction cells are set at high temperatures and pressure that could last for three to four hours instead of 20 minutes.

The final step in the soluble coffee process is to concentrate the extract before spray or freeze drying the product. Ahn says Flavourtech’s evaporation technique is unique in that the liquid remains in its Centritherm evaporator with a residence time of just one second on the low temperature heated surface, eliminating the production of burnt flavours in the final product.

“The whole process is continuous, automated, and designed to provide a premium product. With the IES, customers can produce a consistent product day in, day out, with minimal fuss and labour, and maximum flavour that is more in line with the flavour of a freshly brewed espresso,” Ahn says.

Beyond 2020, which saw more customers appreciate the convenience of soluble products, Ahn says customers are becoming savvier about what they want and are demanding healthier, more natural flavoured products. That’s where Flavourtech can help with its IES system, which Ahn says is the best way for suppliers to retain the natural flavour compounds, antioxidants, and aromas of raw products.

“We speak to lots of roasters who produce a wonderful product that takes ages to perfect. It’s an art to them, and so to make an RTD or soluble coffee with as much care as possible is important to Flavourtech,” Ahn says. “We also talk to global coffee manufacturers, the leaders in their field, and see that the commonality they want for their products is consistency, regardless of the country it’s produced in. For Flavourtech, that consistency is achieved through the automation of our modules and continuous systems.”

Flavourtech has assisted market leading customers with providing processing solutions in Japan, South Korea, China, Taiwan, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand, noting the United States has been using the IES for market leading RTD tea products for 25 years.

In the soluble category, Ahn says there’s a barrier to the conception of quality versus convenience, but with the IES, Flavourtech is confidently helping more customers carry desired flavours forward.

Flavourtech works with coffee houses to conduct flavour analysis and invites its customers to do the same. When analytical data is compared, Ahn says a significant increase in flavour compounds are observed when the flavour is captured prior to high temperature extraction compared to traditional processes.

The company works with small and large customers and systems the world over, but Ahn insists Flavoutech’s IES is for any customer who wants to step up the quality or volume of their product.

“The big global coffee players are the ones producing better soluble and RTD coffees, they’re the

ones that keep coming back to us saying they want to increase production, change profiles and upgrade their system. In each case we listen to their needs, have our diligent team of engineers work with the customer and their manufacturing engineers to design a system according to their factory layout requirements,” Ahn says. “Our system is much smaller, needing only one to two people to operate, and offers a reduced carbon footprint, so naturally we’ve become the equipment provider of choice.”

Ahn recalls one Chinese RTD tea manufacturer who travelled to Flavourtech’s Australian headquarters in Griffith, New South Wales and ran a trial of their product through the IES. They were so pleased with the superior product that they bought an IES on the spot, insistent they needed to have it before the next tea harvest. The customer has purchased further Flavourtech systems thanks to significant business growth each year since they changed their process to the IES. Ahn says the manufacturer is now a market leader in RTD tea products in China and charges a higher premium because of the quality product it produces.

Pre-COVID, customers were invited to take a hands-on approach in the Flavoutech factory and run their product through its IES machines.

However, with COVID-19 travel restrictions in place, Flavoutech conducts trials on the customer’s behalf, sending results back for the customer’s own evaluation.

Customers can rest assured that with Flavourtech’s 35 years of flavour experience, a step into the RTD or soluble market with Flavourtech’s advanced equipment will be a rewarding experience with quality emphasised every step of the way.

“I encourage customers to think about the convenience of new product development and to focus on differentiating themselves based on high quality. Customers are demanding better quality products with natural flavours and Flavourtech can help manufacturers embrace end user preferences with the IES process that is easy to use and offers the opportunity to capture a range of flavours,” Ahn says. “We are confident in the end product we can deliver, and the fact that our customers keep coming back, gives us confidence that they know they are using the right equipment.” G C R For more information, visit flavourtech.com

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SOLUBLE FEATURE NEUHAUS NEOTEC

Land of opportunity NEUHAUS NEOTEC AND DEVEX HAVE TURNED THEIR ATTENTION TO THE US MARKET, WHERE THEY CAN OFFER ROASTERS FLEXIBLE, HIGH-QUALITY, AND COMPLETE SOLUBLE COFFEE SOLUTIONS.

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or more than 50 years, Neuhaus Neotec has made waves in the coffee industry with its unique rotational flex batch (RFB) hot air roasting system.

Working with leading companies around the world, from Italy to Vietnam, has provided the German manufacturer with insight into upcoming trends and how different markets are developing. Neuhaus Neotec Head of Marketing Lars Henkel says the company has also been able to identify gaps in the market

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for new and integrated technical solutions.

“Today, RFB is synonymous with highly efficient roasting without compromise in product quality and aroma. Utilising our roaster’s flexibility, it is possible to produce all varieties of coffee from filter coffee to traditional espresso as well as roasting for soluble coffee extraction processes,” Henkel says.

“Some years ago, [the Behrmann family, owners of the umbrella organisation Kahl Group] identified the growing market for soluble coffee products and decided to integrate the company Devex into their stable.”

Specialising in extraction and concentration processes, Devex is well positioned to meet the needs of the coffee industry for soluble coffee and ready to drink hot or cold brew production.

Devex’s wide body extraction technology guarantees a green yield of one kilogram of instant coffee per 2.1 kilograms of green Robusta beans. Its features include short cycle times for superior extract quality, flexible extraction configurations for high extract concentrations and minimal water and energy consumption, and triple aroma processing for the creation of unique flavour profiles.

Alongside extraction expertise, Devex offers a high level of capability in spray drying and high-volume freeze drying, with the ability to develop both batch and continuous tray-based freeze-drying plants.

Ulrich Nieße, Managing Director of Devex, says there are many synergies between Devex and Neuhaus Neotec, from technological compatibility to quality and considerations of product design.

“Having few internal moving parts, our batch and continuous tray-based freeze-drying plants requiring minimum maintenance. At the same time, they feature robust designs with high production capacity, with load and unload capability of up to 144 product trays simultaneously,” Nieße says.

“Thanks to our close cooperation with Neuhaus Neotec, both companies have gained several prestigious orders and become key players for the soluble coffee industry, in both instant coffee and cold brew or hot brew liquid coffee segments.”

With reaffirmed footing in the European and Asian markets, Neuhaus Neotec has sharpened its focus on another key market for the manufacturer: the United States.

Already, the manufacturer has made deals to supply several large roasting systems within the next two years to one of America’s largest and best-known coffee brands.

“With a more integrated approach, Devex and Neuhaus Neotec plan to capitalise on recent successes with cold brew producers, leveraging both companies’ expertise to deliver complete solutions for customers in traditional coffee,” Henkel says.

To bring this plan into fruition, Neuhaus Neotec recruited coffee industry Scott McQuiston is the Director of veteran Scott McQuiston as its Director of Technical Services in August 2020.

Technical Services at Neuhaus Neotec.

SOLUBLE FEATURE NEUHAUS NEOTEC

McQuiston joined the Kahl Group’s team in the US, alongside several technical engineers, service technicians, and sales representative David Kramer.

With more than 25 years of experience in the coffee industry, McQuiston has worked for leading companies like Kraft and Starbucks, where he led many significant coffee projects involving soluble solutions.

McQuiston tells Global Coffee Report he has enjoyed being part of a tightknit company.

“I’ve always worked for big companies, which can be a little bit impersonal. I appreciate working for a family-owned company with a more intimate environment,” he says.

“Part of our vision for Neuhaus Neotec is to bring that personal contact to the customer.”

McQuiston sees huge potential for both companies in the North American market, where Devex can play off the high regard held for Neuhaus Neotec.

“Neuhaus Neotec is respected for their very novel technology. RFB may be more than 50 years old now, but it’s still a unique technology in the US, where it’s supported by the mystique and quality German engineering is known for,” McQuiston says.

“I’d describe the other big roasting manufacturers as the Mercedes of roasting, while I Devex and Neuhaus Neotec have established an innovation centre in Germany where they trial new technology for coffee processing.

think we’re more like the Audi: younger and more technology driven.”

Combining the capabilities of the two businesses also creates a point of difference in the market, one McQuiston wishes was available to him while working for Starbucks.

“Around 2015, we were looking for a supplier of soluble extraction equipment and had to go with multiple vendors for the spray drier, extractors, evaporators, and roaster,” McQuiston says.

“It worked fine, but had Devex been a part of the Kahl Group back then, they would have been the ideal partners. They could’ve provided the complete solution from green bean intake through to finished powder.”

McQuiston says there are two major applications for soluble solutions in the coffee sector. The obvious one is convenience, where consumers are looking for quick, easy, and functional products.

The second, and more exciting to McQuiston, is their potential as an ingredient in other products.

“We can innovate with that finished powder, because it gives food and beverage companies not used to brewing coffee or handling spent coffee grounds the opportunity to play in the coffee game,” he says.

“A lot of innovation comes out of the US and it’s important to provide a platform for that.

For example, cold brew is a hot trend right now, and if someone could produce an instant cold brew product using our equipment, I think they could create a successful business.”

McQuiston says traditional drip filter used to outsell coffee outsold cold brew, but that has now changed. He adds, however, that while cold brew is on the rise in America for now, it might not be forever. So, equipment suppliers need to offer solutions that are adaptive to different demands.

“The US is such a diverse country, and different parts of the country are looking for different things. The market also changes very fast, so what you need to provide today is flexibility,” he says. “Flexibility is what you get when you buy a Neuhaus Neotec roaster.

You can do a very short or long roast, light or dark roast, and you can do it all with energy efficiency.

“For Devex, flexibility means we’ve got to be able to extract more than just coffee. We need to have applications for beverages using tea, herbs, or seeds, and the legalisation of cannabis has opened up new opportunities.

If I used to make cold brew and now want to make a cannabis product, I want my existing equipment to be able to do that. Devex is uniquely positioned in the industry to offer that.”

To ensure they can continue to provide solutions for new industry developments, Neuhaus Neotec and Devex have built a joint innovation centre at the former’s headquarter in Ganderkesee, Germany. Henkel says the complete pilot plant allows customers to trial tools and technology for roasting, grinding, extraction, freeze drying, and analysis, all with access to inhouse experts.

“Considering the singular successes of both companies, Neuhaus Neotec and Devex are determined to strengthen cooperation to benefit their customers,” Henkel says.

“The coronavirus pandemic is impacting businesses worldwide. However, Neuhaus Neotec and Devex, as part of the Kahl Group, are committed to investing in the future to realise our claims as the ‘go-to organisations’ for soluble coffee, and other new and novel products.” G C R For more information, visit www.neuhaus-neotec.de/en

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SOLUBLE FEATURE PHENOLAEIS

Something in the water PHENOLAEIS IS DEVOTED TO TRANSFORMING HEALTH THROUGH THE USE OF INGREDIENTS WITH FLAVOUR AND FUNCTIONAL BENEFITS, INCLUDING COFFEE.

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offee drinking is often associated with a raft of health benefits, from boosted energy to reduced risks of diabetes, but when health and food science company Phenolaeis saw an opportunity to combine coffee with a botanical ingredient that promotes mood state and wellness, the natural synergy was obvious.

The result is Phenolaeis’ functional freeze-dried coffee with Palm Fruit Extract. The product contains 5 per cent Palm Fruit Extract to optimise flavour, antioxidant, and other wellness benefits based on benchtop and clinical research. Phenolaeis Sales and Marketing Vice President John Musselman says the plant-based natural fruit extract provides an interesting balance of natural polyphenols and compounds for an enhanced flavour experience in coffee applications.

“The result is a more premium-tasting coffee. We source coffee beans from Mexico for our freeze-dried coffee product. Once the Palm Fruit Extract is added in the coffee, it suppresses bitterness and reduces the astringency often found in coffee,” he says.

“We’re also finding that it improves the body of the coffee and overall mouthfeel. We’ve had some people say that they’re a ‘coffee snob or aficionado’ and that they wouldn’t typically drink instant coffee, but actually admit it’s good, quite good.”

Phenolaeis invited Q Graders from Brazil to evaluate the effect of adding Palm Fruit Extract to coffee and validate Phenolaeis’ findings in terms of flavour characteristics. In addition to its flavour properties, the natural compounds found in the palm fruit extract are set to boost focus and sharpen the mind.

Phenolaeis is conducting clinical research on mood and cognitive state with e-gamers who actively look for food and beverage products that help with focus and mental fatigue.

“We are doing a growing body of research, but our early research and pre-clinical work has been

Phenolaeis’ palm fruit is sourced in Chiapas, Mexico from Uumbal, a sustainable oil palm plantation and mill company.

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Phenolaeis Sales and Marketing Vice President John Musselman.

on oxidated stress, anti-aging, antioxidants in immune pathways, and inflammatory markers over long-term impact, looking at how we age, health wise and age wise,” Musselman says.

“If we’re going to advise making any type of health claims, we need to make sure we have good research with high quality science to back it up. But already a lot of our

SOLUBLE FEATURE PHENOLAEIS

research trials are pointing to cognitive health benefits [of palm fruit].”

Phenolaeis is committed to promoting metabolic health and supporting the health of the planet by pioneering new ways to responsibly produce functional ingredients.

A research team from the Malaysia Palm Oil Board in collaboration with professors from Massachusetts Institute of Technology pioneered the foundation of Phenolaeis’ research and development.

They were looking to find a more efficient use for the water stream from oil palm mills, which is typically used for irrigation or composting. They found that throwing away the water stream resulted Phenolaeis’ functional freeze-dried in throwing away ingredients that could potentially coffee with Palm Fruit Extract. provide beneficial health properties.

“Upon further testing, we discovered the water-soluble components from palm fruit processing contained a botanical and vital nutrient that, due to its chemistry makeup, contains a unique blend of polyphenols with antioxidant properties and compounds that supports the immune system,” Musselman says.

Palm Fruit Extract, also known as Palm Fruit Bioactive Complex, is a multi-function, specialty ingredient that contains at least five unique polyphenols plus protein, fiber, and carbohydrates.

This water-soluble complex is sustainably sourced from oil palm fruits, one of nature’s richest sources of natural polyphenols.

Most oil palm fruit comes from Indonesia and Malaysia, but when Phenolaeis looked for a producing partner a little closer to home, it found Uumbal, a sustainable oil palm plantation and mill company, to co-locate its first commercial facility in Chiapas, Mexico.

As such, Phenolaeis works with Uumbal to repurpose a historically unused water stream from oil palm fruit processing into an extract at its facility in Chiapas, Mexico.

“When we partnered with Uumbal, their holistic commitment to sustainability was one of the primary reasons. All of our sustainability and environmentally-friendly objectives were satisfied because they reforested land with oil palm trees on an ex-cattle farm and don’t chop down trees or displace local animals. It was important to see they supported the same environmental ethos as us,” Musselman says.

In addition, Phenolaeis was introduced to top-tier soluble coffee manufacturer Cafesca, a division of ECOM Trading, who has a large, freeze-dried coffee facility in Tapachula, Mexico.

Born from a collaboration with Cafesca was Phenolaeis’ first functional coffee product with Palm Fruit Extract.

The functional coffee space is an active market around the world. Musselman says some consumers just want coffee in its purest form, while others throughout the world are seeking functional coffees and beverages that include additives and functional ingredients that can be added to tea, coffee and cocoa, or used in healthy formulations such as sugar-free with stevia.

“What we found when we did a soft launch last year, is that because Palm Fruit Extract is a new, specialty ingredient, companies were not immediately sure what to do with it. Then, pair that situation with COVID-19, and it was a commercial challenge,” Musselman says.

“But on the other hand, what we found during COVID-19 is that lots of people experienced an overall brain fog and more mental fatigue, carrying stress from daily life, like juggling work with home schooling the kids. More people were actively looking and researching for products online that could help reduce stress and improve immunity. I think we’ll continue to see people take a more active role in personalised nutrition. The ingredients that exist at the intersection of great taste, health, and convenience, with some type of sustainability commitment by a manufacturer, whether its coffee or another beverage, will be the product of choice for consumers.”

Palm Fruit Extract, as a 100-per-cent water soluble powder, can be mixed in roasted and ground

The water-soluble components from palm fruit processing contain a unique blend of polyphenols that support the immune system.

coffee and in ready-to-drink and single serve formats. Flavours, such as chocolate or cream, liquids or other functional ingredients such as fibre can be easily blended into the base formula crystals without changing their appearance.

Phenolaeis works closely with customers to create private label options that are suitable for glass bottle packaging as well as single serves, stick packs, box, bags, and sachets.

“We’ve had lot of interest from roasting companies and their engineers, asking for ways to include the Palm Fruit Extract in their soluble products, and lots of interest from the cold brew community. The beauty is that you can do a lot of things with it. Our first answer is usually “yes” to most things. We try to find solutions,” Musselman says.

“The fact that Palm Fruit Extract is water soluble, non-GMO and has a mild, pleasant taste, means we can use it easily in many applications. If a customer wants to add plant protein or immunity ingredients to coffee with 30 to 200 milligrams of our Palm Fruit Extract, we can do it.”

Already Phenolaeis has plans for further expansion of its range to Europe, the Asia Pacific, and the Americas, and is confident in five years’ time it will have many more partners in key regions around the world.

“We’re excited to see the potential of this product. We want others to get excited too and experience the benefits,” Musselman says.

“If we get customers telling us they can feel or notice the benefit, then the sky’s the limit.” G C R For more information, visit www.phenolaeis.com

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Credit: CIRAD

RESEARCH CIRAD

Genetic potential ARABICA AND ROBUSTA MAY DOMINATE COFFEE CULTIVATION, BUT CIRAD IS EXPLORING THE POSSIBILITIES OF THREE WILD COFFEE SPECIES THAT COULD DIVERSIFY PRODUCTION.

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here are more than 124 species of coffee in the world, but only two – Coffea arabica and Coffea canephora (Robusta) – are cultivated at large volumes. The reason being, according to Benoît Bertrand, Geneticist and Coffee Value Chain Correspondent at the French Agricultural Research Centre for International Development (CIRAD), that until recently no other species were needed.

“We have two ‘champions’ in C. arabica and C. canephora. Arabica is special because of its very high quality, and for Robusta, the interest is in its high profitability – producing large volumes – and functionality – being usable in products like instant coffee,” Bertrand says.

“In the Philippines and Malaysia, there’s also a small production of Coffea liberica , but it’s marginal because the taste is not so good and the species is being abandoned in Africa due to [coffee wilt disease].”

However, with the rise of specialty coffee around the world, Bertrand says there is an increasing interest to try new things, whether that be origins, post-harvest techniques, or even coffee species. At the same time, coffee producers are looking for new ways to increase the profitability and resilience of their crops.

“There’s too much coffee on the market, so the price for producers is low. The challenge is increasing coffee’s profitability, like has happened for other crops, wine for example. For years, wine was a product of low value, until the 1970s when a few chateaus or terroirs began receiving better prices. We need to think how we can do the same for coffee,” Bertrand says.

“How can we differentiate and produce better coffee with unique qualities? With this new [specialty coffee] trend, we think there’s opportunity to introduce new species that could allow farmers to produce coffee with a higher profitability.”

In early 2020, CIRAD – in collaboration with World Coffee Research and the Institute of Applied Genomics in Italy – published research showing that all Arabica coffee originated from

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Coffea stenophylla originates in the west of Africa.

a single plant 10,000 to 20,000 years ago.

This “super individual” as Bertrand describes it, resulted from the cross of two species that don’t usually breed – C. canephora and Coffea eugenioides – and was able to self-reproduce, also extremely rare but not impossible for a cross-species plant like this.

Because all Arabica coffee resulted from this one relatively new plant, the species has a very limited genetic diversity. This makes it quite sensitive to climate change and disease.

“Arabica is a super individual in the way it

Credit: CIRAD

Credit: CIRAD

shade. In the future, it could potentially be adapted to grow in new conditions, like the Amazon or other parts of the world.”

These three species could be grown as crops themselves or crossed with Arabica or Robusta to produce sturdier plants.

Regardless of the plant’s potential resistance to new environmental conditions, the species won’t be viable as crops if people don’t want to drink them.

“We have to imagine and adopt crops to scenarios of global warming, changing temperatures, and decreasing or increasing precipitation while maintaining the productivity and quality of the product,” Bertrand says.

“It’s a complicated matter, and before we introduce and start testing these new species, we need to evaluate their sensory qualities to see if they’re good enough for consumption.”

To do this, CIRAD organised a tasting session on 10 December 2020 with three of its own researchers and 12 cuppers from coffee businesses across Europe. They included Jacobs Douwe Egberts, Coffea stenophylla, Coffea brevipes, Nespresso, Starbucks, Supremo, AST Sensory Skills, l’Arbre à Café, and Coffea congensis could potentially rival Robusta in terms of quality.

La Claque, and Belco. Of the 12 jurors, eight attended the cupping in person and four took part remotely due to COVID-19 restrictions. was able to be cultivated and grown in more The three species were roasted in three different ways to ensure the coffees expressed all of than 50 countries around the world, but it faces their aroma potential. They were presented to tasters in a blind cupping, alongside a Robusta problems with disease. The main problem is coffee from Indonesia, a commodity-grade Arabica from Brazil, and a specialty Arabica from leaf rust, which manages to evolve as breeders Ethiopia. Jurors sat at socially distanced benches where a red light was used to mask visible introduce new defences and resistances to the differences in the coffee, ensuring they focused only on sense of smell and taste. plant,” Bertrand says.

“It was very interesting, because out of the 15 judges, they all had the same categorisation Climate change also poses a challenge in of the products. The best coffee was the best coffee for everyone,” Bertrand says. the future as temperatures rise and weather CIRAD cannot reveal the exact results of the session until the research is officially becomes erratic. To address this, CIRAD began published, however, Bertrand tells Global Coffee Report it has given researchers reassurance analysing wild coffee species to determine in the possibilities of the three species. their viability for coffee cultivation.

“The three species are good enough to be consumed and some provide qualities as good Three species in particular stood out to as a specialty coffee,” he says.

CIRAD as having potential and resistance to “The next step is to export seeds to a country where we can study the species in an leaf rust: Coffea stenophylla, Coffea brevipes, agronomic situation at different altitudes with different climates.” and Coffea congensis.

While the three species hold potential, Bertrand says this next stage of research is critical “C. congensis is a species born in Africa, to see how they will handle being grown in CIRAD held a cupping sessions to in the [Congo river basin], so the species is different locations and conditions. assess the viability of three new coffee well adapted to excess precipitation or water.

“We cannot say that these species will species as potential crops.

It could be interesting for some regions of the challenge the two champions, but they might world where there is too much precipitation fill certain ecological niches with higher to grow coffee,” Bertrand says. temperatures, excess water, and rainforest “C. stenophylla comes from the west of climates,” Bertrand says.

Africa, where the climate is very dry, with “This is the intent, but it is impossible a temperature higher than is suitable for to say if we will have success with these Arabica. We might be able to use stenophylla species. For example, one could reveal it in those areas in the future where higher is very susceptible to a disease. When you temperatures will be more common. deploy a new species in different conditions, “C. brevipes comes from small mountains you could face something you never imagined in central Arica – Cameroon, Gabon, and before.

Congo – where it grows about 1000 metres “We have to be careful. The road is long above sea level. On those small mountains, in to develop a new species and it is never sure. the Equatorial rainforest, there is a different We can’t abandon a species because you can climate with a high plant diversity and a lot of never know what the future will bring.” G C R

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PROFILE Timothy Schilling

One wild ride THE INDIANA JONES OF THE COFFEE INDUSTRY, DR TIMOTHY SCHILLING, REFLECTS ON A PROFESSIONAL CAREER THAT HAS INSPIRED, IMPROVED AND CHANGED THE FUTURE OF COFFEE FOR THE BETTER.

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n the first five minutes of Dr Timothy Schilling’s interview with Global Coffee Report, he makes one thing clear from the get-go: he’s not leaving coffee for good. The scientist and World Coffee Research (WCR) Founder and President is, however, concluding 20 professional years in the industry that’s given him countless friendships and memories to last a lifetime.

“Coffee is a love of mine. It’s not just a job or profession, it’s a love that will continue,” he says.

One of six kids, Schilling grew up in northern Georgia, United States, watching his “typical American coffee drinking parents” indulge in Folgers, Maxwell House, and Eight O’Clock percolated coffee, which he started drinking at 12 years of age.

Schilling had a curious nature about biological things and systems but dropped out of high school and got a full-time job at an automotive parts shop. It didn’t take long before Schilling realised he wasn’t fulfilling his potential.

He went back to night school, studying biology as an avenue to work in agricultural production.

After he obtained a bachelor’s degree, Schilling joined the American Peace Corps, determined to use his knowledge of science to help others. He was sent to Lavras, Minas Gerais, Brazil where he lived with a coffee farming family and had his second encounter with coffee.

He learned about coffee as an agronomist and was blown away by the culture of coffee farming.

“I was super impressed and enamoured with coffee as a crop – so complex, so sophisticated,” Schilling says.

After his Peace Corps experience, Schilling returned to the US where a former professor gave him a scholarship to complete his Master’s degree in agronomy and plant breeding at the University of Georgia, followed by a PhD in plant genetics at North Carolina State University for better job prospects. But before he did, Schilling was offered a job as a peanut breeder for the Cameroon government through a US government-funded project. He packed his bags for one year and stayed for seven, finishing his PhD over there.

“Most of my life has been working in African countries, but Cameroon was my first experience of African life and it was a special one. It had desert, cool ethnic groups, wilderness, it was super interesting,” he says.

Dr Timothy Schilling (left) has devoted the past 20 years to helping improve crop quality and farmer income.

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PROFILE Timothy Schilling

On his return, Schilling worked as the Associate Director for a Collaborative Research Support Program linking American university professors with counterpart researchers in developing countries working on constraints to sorghum and millet production. He did this work for five years, mainly in Southern Africa, before another five years in West Africa running a large research enhancement project.

Once again, on his return, Schilling was in demand. Michigan State University asked if he would be interested working on a project in Rwanda, which Schilling says “had nothing yet everything to do with coffee”.

“Part of the project was to develop outreach programs to take technologies to farmers to try and improve their processes and increase their incomes. That was the part that was interesting to me. But what was even more compelling was working in the context of helping rebuild Rwanda’s agricultural sector, still largely suffering the aftereffects of the Rwandan genocide, and to help lots of people,” he says.

“That’s where I ran into coffee again, because we did a lot of economic appraisals in the rural areas to determine what commodity might be able to generate income. When we got to coffee, with 400,000 Rwandan farmers with roughly 200 trees each, it was a no brainer. It was clear to see that if you were able to increase the price the farmers got by even one or five cents, it would have a huge effect and uplift on the rural economy. I wondered why no one had done anything of the sort before, but as I moved deeper in, I saw why: the Rwandan system at the time was a monopoly, the system was corrupt, the coffee was lousy, and it was being penalised on the C market at 50 points under its worth.”

Determined to see the potential for himself, Schilling had a friend in Texas assess the Rwandan green beans for any intrinsic quality values of ‘good’ or ‘specialty coffee’. The results were “nothing extraordinary”, bad not bad either. The problem then, Schilling says, was getting all those 400,000 farmers and their family members to not process the coffee in 400,000 different ways. “They needed to bring their coffee cherry harvests together in the one place, pulp it, dry it, and sell it together, and that’s what they did. It was all about increasing quality, because high quality would increase income, and it did,” Schilling says.

“Seeing the potential was easy enough, but

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Timothy Schilling endured a decade of challenges to help rebuild Rwanda’s coffee sector and improve the lives of the farming community post-genocide.

the execution and figuring out how to get it done was very challenging to say the least. The sector was corrupt. There was so much money tied up in the system and the farmers were getting none of it. It was a constant uphill battle because no-one in the coffee sector wanted to transform the sector, thinking they’d only get hurt by it.”

The key was persistence, and a little bit of luck. The first piece of luck was that the C market was the lowest it had ever been at 45 US cents. Why was that lucky? Because when the coffee sold at $1.40 US cents per pound on that market, it turned heads and everybody wanted in. The second piece of luck was the support of the Rwandan President Paul Kagame, whom Schilling describes as an “avant-garde, cool, super intelligent, incredible person”.

Kagame made clear that the Rwandan coffee sector was changing and would become more of a priority for the country. “That kind of language squashed a lot of the corruption in the local supply chain and eventually allowed a ‘specialty sector’ to grow,” Schilling says.

“In the very beginning, the local supply chain didn’t really think anything would come of our efforts. Many development specialists thought we had laughable objectives. But this gave us some freedom to prove our concept by producing container loads of coffee that were sold for two to three times the C market price. All of a sudden, the farmers were literally polishing their cherries and getting enormous value,” he says.

At the same time, big brands such as Green Mountain, Counter Culture Coffee and Intelligentsia Coffee were looking for the “new origin” of 2002 and 2003, and what their support did, was create a bubble of excitement for Rwandan production.

“Then we pulled another first by bringing in the Cup of Excellence to Africa. That’s when things exploded even more,” Schilling says. “Those are some of the ingredients of our success, but we wouldn’t have done it without the government, ministers, and all the partner support. It was a major undertaking.”

Schilling oversaw the rebuilding project in Rwanda for 10 years. It was really a decade-long effort to initiate, and five additional years to have the systems engrained in the culture of the Rwandan government and with farmers and the wider industry.

The last time Schilling travelled to Rwanda was 2019. Each time he does, he says it brings tears to his eyes.

“Discovering and watching with my own eyes how coffee quality was transforming the rural economy with increased incomes and hope is so powerful you can’t believe it. And to know the people, see them daily, and then observe the change in their lives, is unreal. Ten years on, the kids are smiling, they’re wearing nice dresses and shoes, and living in houses with roofs instead of straw

huts. At one point, I started counting the number of hair salons in the tiny village – that was the real indicator of rural success because on last count there was seven for about 1000 people,” Schilling says.

After Rwanda, Schilling addressed the fact that the multi-billion-dollar coffee sector, that was driven by quality, actually had done very little research on the science of coffee quality. He had devised an experiment to look at the impact transport of coffee cherries had on final coffee quality and was “flabbergasted” when he conducted a simple scientific literature review and no-one had done anything on the subject prior.

He shared his dismay to Ric Rhinehart, former President of Groundwork Coffee and former Executive Director of the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA), who was buying Rwandan coffee at the time. He encouraged Schilling to write a concept about this idea and the need for a quality research organisation that he could take to the SCA board. Now part of the SCA Board of Directors himself, Schilling presented the concept to the then-known SCAA Symposium, which attracted roasters, exporting companies, and scientists.

“We told them what agricultural research could do for the commodity and asked if this is something they wanted and would support, because it needs a substantial volume of money each year to do a good job and move the needle on quality and volume. The result was a resounding ‘yes’ and off we went,” Schilling says.

And so WCR was formed in 2012. Significant early investments from Farmer Brothers, Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (now Keurig Dr. Pepper) and the J.M. Smucker Company allowed WCR to really “turn on” and grow fast, funding core research initiatives around the world.

Through Schilling’s position as Executive Director of WCR, he was able to develop and oversee WCR’s Nursery Development Program, the creation of the Coffee Lexicon and Arabica Varieties Catalogue, and launch the International Multilocation Variety Trial, among many other projects.

One that Schilling treasures most is the WCR network of trials in farmers’ fields.

“We put in place 260 trials in 14 counties, co-managed by dozens of exporters, NGO and coop partners to test better varieties right in the farmers’ field where it matters,” Schilling says. “We took the best three varietals in each country, replicated them, and activated research trials on individual farms. WCR was responsible for educating producers on the benefit of replacing old varieties and technologies with new, higher yielding varieties and practices to include profitability.”

Schilling says it’s one thing to have a project or technology that can generate income, and another thing entirely to get it into the hands of farmers.

What also excites Schilling about the power of science is coffee breeding for increased quality, which he says is “the key to the future” sustainability of the industry.

“Selective breeding just for quality has never really been done before. Usually, in the past, quality was a variable to consider at the very end of the breeding process. By that time, you may have lost the highest quality material so breeding for quality really is the next step: finding out which plants are carrying high quality genetics and then utilising their genomic properties to create the next generation of improved varieties,” he says.

Schilling notes that collaborative research endeavours are going to be needed to drive progress.

For example, French Agricultural Research Centre for International Development (CIRAD) worked together with ECOM Agroindustrial Corp to produce F1 hybrids such as Mundo Maya and Starmaya – major milestone varieties which he says are “huge lights of hope” for the industry.

Collaborations between Italian researchers, Illy and Lavazza led to the publication of the first public arabica genome, and WCR is partnering Timothy Schilling says coffee breeding for increased quality is key to the with advanced research institutes and national industry’s long-term sustainability. governments to speed up innovation and get it

into farmers’ hands.

Another beacon of hope is the 30 to 35 origin agronomists Schilling lectures to about climate change and production at illy’s Università del Caffè in Trieste, Italy.

“These coffee professionals are so young, excited, and passionate. They want to save the world and make their country’s coffee the best it can be. So that’s where I hope to be putting my energy,” he says.

Schilling is also working with several espresso professionals, UC Davis and the SCA on a new sensory quality protocol to evaluate green coffee for espresso beverages at origin.

It’s no surprise then that the word “retirement” is not one Schilling associates with lawn bowls and bird watching. Rather, the US-born scientist will continue living in the French Alps, surrounded by family, and use his “down time” to clear his mind and put his energy into passion projects. The problem for Schilling, however, is that he constantly devises new ideas and projects.

“Retirement is only the space between two directions, but I don’t know what my next direction is right now,” he says.

“What attracts me to the industry and what has kept me there for 20 years is the people. Normally, agricultural scientists change crop focuses constantly, you don’t have an emotional attachment to a plant. But in coffee, I’ve found an abundance of really compelling, compassionate people in both coffee consuming and producing countries, and how cool is that.” G C R

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R&D Single serve report

Solid serve to capsule study CONSUMER INTEREST AND ECONOMIC IMPORTANCE OF SINGLE SERVE COFFEE PRODUCTS CONTINUES TO GROW, YET THE SECTOR REMAINS A RELATIVELY UNTOUCHED SCIENTIFIC FIELD. GCR SPEAKS TO PROFESSOR CHAHAN YERETZIAN ON EXTRACTING A SERIES OF GUIDELINES TO ACHIEVE A STABLE EXTRACTION PROCESS.

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n October 2020, Scientific Reports published a paper on the Extraction of single serve coffee capsules: linking properties of ground coffee to extraction dynamics and cup quality.

Authors André Eiermann, Samo Smrke, Loïc‑Marco Guélat, Marco Wellinger, Anja Rahn and Prof. Chahan Yeretzian set out to clarify the variables that govern coffee extraction from single serve coffee capsules.

Why? Because, according to Yeretzian, Professor for Analytical Chemistry, Bioanalytical Chemistry and Diagnostics at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences in Wädenswil, Switzerland, and Head of the Coffee Excellence Center, single serve is the fastest growing segment within the larger category of coffee.

The global coffee pod and capsule market combined is expected to grow from US$15 billion in 2017 to US$29 billion by 2025, according to Fior Markets, at a compound annular growth rate of 8.5 per cent.

The high-pressure extraction capsules segment alone, which was the focus of this study, currently leads the coffee pod and capsule market, and was valued at around US$9.61 billion in 2017 (63 per cent of the whole single serve coffee segment). The domestic consumption of single serve coffee is expected to increase due to globally imposed lockdowns during the coronavirus pandemic.

“One critical success factor is the proper adjustment of a range of input parameters like roast, grind, filling, water minerality, degassing, packaging material, pressure, and atmosphere inside capsules to achieve a consistent and stable extraction,” Yeretzian says.

“The main goal of this study was to reveal the key relationship between input parameters such as variety/blend, roast, grind, degassing and packaging, with the consistency of the extraction process and cup profile.”

Much research has been done on espresso and filter coffee, but when it comes to single serve, Yeretzian says it comes down to the fact that extraction is an intrinsically highly complex research subject, and because learnings gained from studying espresso extraction on a professional portafilter coffee machine do not apply directly to single serve coffee extraction.

The research group started with the hypothesis that grind and roast degree would be critical in finding general guidelines for a stable extraction. Upon completion, however, they realised that the particle size distribution, and in particular the share of fines (Q100 micrometres), defined as the volume share of particles smaller than 100 micrometres in size, was of particular important to understanding the extraction process.

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Chahan Yeretzian, Professor for Analytical Chemistry, Bioanalytical Chemistry and Diagnostics at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences in Wädenswil, Switzerland.

Over a period of about six months, the study was conducted on 43 Nespresso and Nespresso-compatible capsules of the same geometry using the same machine.

In order for the study to be relevant to products actually available on the market, the research group chose to start with actual commercial products obtained from local supermarkets. The problem of working with such ‘real market samples,’ Yeretzian says, is the limited or complete lack of control over a range of important input parameters such

as the varieties, blends, roast degree/profiles, and grind.

“Instead of controlling [every detail], some parameters remained either unknown, such as the variety of coffee, or were measured (particle size distribution). Hence, we had little control over the experimental plan,” he says. “The uncertainly for some input parameters also created some ‘noise’, an added uncertainly.”

The internal pressure of each capsule was estimated, oxygen content inside the capsules measured, with each one opened and thoroughly emptied to measure the weight of coffee in each capsule.

The roast level and particle size were determined and analysed, using at least 10 grams each, and three measurements made per capsule type.

Each coffee was extracted from the capsule using a Krups Inissia XN1005 capsule machine. The aim was to reach 40 grams.

The extractions were timed and manually stopped.

The concentration of coffee in the filtered brew was then analysed using a refractometer and calibrated with a soluble coffee sample.

The extraction percentage was calculated based on the mean weight of the coffee in each capsule type, brew weight, and refractometric Total Dissolved Solid (TDS) measurement.

Brew analysis and sensory tests of the coffees was performed by three certified Q Arabica Graders from the Coffee Excellence Center. The sensory quality attributes that were determined were flavour, acidity, body, and balance on a scale from five to 10. The quality of each attributes was assessed by tasting three replicates of the brew by each of the Q-grader.

“Data from the sensory analysis is often subject to huge variability and large standard deviation, precluding a correlation with instrumental and input data. The most important requirement for this study was hence to achieve the highest possible reproducibility among repetitions of the

“THE MOST IMPORTANT REQUIREMENT FOR THIS STUDY WAS HENCE TO ACHIEVE THE HIGHEST POSSIBLE REPRODUCIBILITY AMONG REPETITIONS OF THE SAMPLE CAPSULE AND DIFFERENTIATION AMONG DIFFERENT CAPSULES.” Chahan Yeretzian

Professor for Analytical Chemistry, Bioanalytical Chemistry and Diagnostics, Zurich University of Applied Sciences and Head of the Coffee Excellence Center.

sample capsule and differentiation among different samples. The lack of correlation of the sensory profile to technical parameters was not surprising since the most important driver of cup profile and quality was the green coffee quality (varieties and blend), which were yet unknown to us,” Yeretzian says.

Despite the wide variety of different capsule coffee formulations used for the production of capsules subjected to this study, the research team drew three general conclusions with respect to the extraction of coffee from capsules and espresso brew properties.

1. T he capsule extraction dynamics are highly influenced by the particle size distribution of coffee grounds. Only mean or median particle size information is insufficient to understand capsule extraction. The proportion of fines was highly correlated with increased extraction time.

2. The best way to increase TDS is to use more coffee for extraction, or to grind the coffee more finely to increase extraction efficiency. Grinding finer to increase extraction comes with a technical problem – finer grind sizes tend to form more finer particles in the grounds, which cause a decreased permeability of the coffee bed. Yeretzian says this learning is in line with what is known from studies on espresso extracted on a professional portafilter machine.

3. Cup sensory quality is not correlated to the technical variables of the ground coffee. It is suspected that cup quality is mainly driven by green coffee quality. While Yeretzian says this is probably a very general conclusion, it is important to recognise that technical extraction parameters do modulate cup quality.

With initial conclusions drawn, Yeretzian and his team of researchers are driven to further explore these main learnings in a more controlled experiment and to see whether they apply to espresso extracted on a professional portafilter machine.

As a result of these early findings, Yeretzian hopes they will help manufacturers develop coffee capsule ranges that achieve more consistent and constant extraction in terms of extraction flow and cup weight. “[It would be great to see] more rational design of coffee capsules with improved consistency, and more professional customer support in case of reported inconsistencies in extraction performance,” he says. G C R

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PROFILE Bewley’s

Leading the way SINCE 1840, BEWLEY’S HAS HELPED GROW IRELAND’S COFFEE CULTURE AND IS SHARING IT WITH THE REST OF THE WORLD.

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elebrating its 180th anniversary in 2020, Bewley’s has had a profound impact on the Irish coffee scene. Managing Director Jason Doyle tells Global Coffee Report that the company owes its longevity to the strength of the ties it has built in the Irish community.

“The Bewley’s brand has one of the highest recognition rates among consumers in Ireland. When they speak about coffee, they speak about Bewley’s, and vice

versa,” Doyle says.

“People and consumers are at the centre of everything we do, from coffee farmers and brokers to people we employ and families we support.”

Samuel Bewley and his son Charles first imported tea into Ireland in 1835. Five years later, Charles’ brother Joshua turned their operation into the full-fledged business that still exists today.

The Bewley family were all practicing Quakers, and made their values of community and equality core pillars of the brand. Doyle says Bewley’s continues to embody these traits.

“To me, the Quakers are all about giving back and being sustainable, and that’s how we continue to act to this day,” he says. “To reach 180 and still be doing what our founders intended is a big milestone for us and for the Irish coffee industry.”

Bewley’s opened its first café in 1894, the first in Ireland to roast coffee in-store. Joshua’s son Ernest took over the business in the early 1900s and imported the first Jersey cows into Ireland to supply the growing demand for good quality milk and cream for his cafés.

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In 1927, Ernest opened Bewley’s Oriental Café, a flagship for Bewley’s that serves coffee and represents the best of the brand to this day.

“The beating heart for our business is Grafton Street. It’s where we bring to life experiences, escapism, and the coffee journey for our consumers,” Doyle says.

“When our master roasters bring in coffee from far origins, it’s the job of our baristas to present that work and what our brand represents to the customer.”

Ernest’s son Victor became Managing Director of Bewley’s in 1932 and spent the next 40 or so years turning it into an Irish institution.

By the 1980s, the Bewley’s brand had changed hands several times before the Campbell family stepped up to the plate.

“The business has passed through various generations and families over the years. Patrick

Sheila Dowling is the Sales Director at Bewley’s.

and Veronica Campbell bought Bewley’s and elevated the business, opening it to new business channels and expanding into new markets like the United Kingdom and United States,” Doyle says.

With numerous business channels including foodservice, retail, and private label in a number of countries, Bewley’s has reached an annual turnover of €200 million (about US$240 million).

Doyle says the brand’s success comes from its ability to evolve, innovate, and achieve many firsts in the Irish market.

“Bewley’s has always been first. For instance, we were the first coffee business in Ireland to offer barista education to all of our customers,” he says.

“Going back to our Quaker origins, giving back is crucial to us and education is a big part of that. We’ve trained numerous World, Irish, and British Barista champions. At last count, we had trained more than 2000 baristas in Ireland across various different customers.”

Despite the longevity of the Bewley’s brand, there was little that could have prepared the roaster for what was to come in 2020. The COVID-19 pandemic forced many businesses, industries, and countries to adapt quickly.

Doyle says supporting Bewley’s customers and employees was its key priority through the pandemic.

“We employ just under 200 people in the Irish market, and when our flagship is at full capacity, it’s also employing about 140 people between full- and part-time staff. For us, the focus in the short term is on protecting our

Jason Doyle is the Managing Director at Bewley’s.

Dave Jameson is the Head of Coffee and Sustainability at Bewley’s

people and the businesses we’ve grown to love,” he says.

“We’ve never been so nimble or quick to innovate and change. As we move out of this pandemic, we will evolve all of the solutions we’d brought to the market over the last 12 months.”

FIRST IN SUSTAINABILITY Bewley’s was also the first brand in Ireland to import Fairtrade certified coffee in 1996. Twenty years later, it announced that all Bewley’s branded coffee going forward would be Fairtrade certified.

Dave Jameson, Head of Coffee and Sustainability at Bewley’s, says there is a strong sustainability ethos and structure in Bewley’s that comes from the top down.

“Bewley’s is such a significant contributor to Fairtrade in Ireland that one out of every two Fairtrade coffees sold in Ireland is a Bewley’s coffee,” Jameson says.

“When you boil it down and look into the details, Bewley’s contributes 1.5 per cent of all Fairtrade premiums paid to coffee farmers globally. It’s incredible when you think about the scale of some of the operators in the market.”

Working with Fairtrade has allowed Bewley’s to build strong networks with its producers. Jameson says buying Fairtrade Organic coffees, with an additional premium, on top of a cooperative’s larger crop of Fairtrade coffees, creates a ‘Fairtrade pyramid’ that secures producers a meaningful income.

“Fairtrade goes beyond the premium, it’s about the relationships and knowing the people we work with. We don’t go out and say ‘we need a Fairtrade Honduras or Fairtrade Colombia’, we say ‘we need this coffee from these groups’,” Jameson says.

“What brings me the most satisfaction is talking to these producers on a daily basis. It’s not uncommon for me to get a WhatsApp from a producer in Honduras at 10pm at night, fed through Google Translate, that lets me see what’s going on there with my own eyes.”

In Colombia, Bewley’s has contributed to a coffee academy – joint funded with a UK customer, Olam Specialty Coffee, and the Fairtrade Foundation – that provides training and education to a community that missed out on traditional schooling.

“It’s in the town of Planadas, a post-conflict zone, where there are many people in their mid-20s working on coffee farms that hadn’t been able to go to high school because it was just too dangerous to leave the farm at the time,” Jameson says.

“These young people are dependent on the coffee industry in that area to earn a living. If coffee ceases to be viable they have no other options. The aim of this academy is to provide agricultural training so they can produce better quality and yields and improve the quality of life these younger coffee farmers can achieve.”

In Honduras, Bewley’s has a longstanding partnership with Comisuyl, a cooperative that, several years ago, saw its production plummet due to coffee leaf rust. Bewley’s continued buying what it could

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PROFILE Bewley’s

from the cooperative until they were back in the black. Jameson says the cooperative was eventually receiving enough income to improve its processes.

“One of the things they did with the Fairtrade premium was invest in solar powered milling facilities at the cooperative,” he says. “That inspired us to buy carbon credits to offset our CO2 emissions from that group, honouring their commitment to the environment with one of our own.”

Bewley’s headquarters in Dublin has been carbon neutral since 2008, and from the following year, has offset all of its Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions in Ireland and the UK to become Ireland’s first fully carbon neutral coffee brand.

Since 2010, the company has also dropped the waste it sends to landfill by 84 per cent and reduced its CO2 emissions per tonne of manufactured coffee by 62 per cent.

“Sustainability is not something where you reach a finish line. It’s continually evolving and there’s always something you need to do next,” Jameson says.

“We have plans in place to continue our work in Honduras, Colombia, and Nicaragua. There, we recently managed to move contracts around to purchase an extra container of coffee, worth US$100,000, from a farm which saw a devasting landslide last year and needed the extra income.

One of the levers we can pull is aid through trade – the biggest impact you can have on the environment as a coffee business is through the coffee you’re buying.”

LEADING TRENDS On the consumption side of the industry, Bewley’s has stayed on top of new trends that emerge in the market. One of the largest shifts in recent years – according to Sheila Dowling, Sales Director at Bewley’s – is the newfound popularity of plant-based alternatives to dairy milk.

Bewley’s contributes to about 1.5 per “This trend started in the retail sector, with people buying plant-based cent of all Fairtrade premiums globally. milks to drink at home. It then became common to expect it as an option in cafés and now it’s seen through restaurants and foodservice,” Dowling says.

“It offers choice. People aren’t only drinking it because it’s vegan or healthier. Even some dairy surprise me to see vitamins incorporated into drinkers want it because they actually prefer the flavour. We’ve done a lot of work with our coffee the roasting of coffee,” Dowling says. blends and plant-based alternatives to make sure we’re suiting the right coffee to the right milk.”

“Something else Bewley’s has started work Another emerging trend Bewley’s sees is increasing automation. In cafés, Dowling says this is seen on is blockchain technology. We use 100 per in automated grinders, Puqpress tampers, pre-programmed espresso machines, and automatic milk cent Fairtrade coffee, so there’s transparency steamers. In other sectors, she says there has been a dramatic rise in the last few years of the quality and traceability there we could share from crop level a fully automatic machine is able to produce. to cup.”

“When you look at the convenience sector, the coffee experience used to be considered ‘standard’, While Bewley’s will continue to lead Ireland somewhere you only go if you can’t go anywhere else. But over the past five years, the machines and as these new trends emerge, Dowling says the the technology inside them have evolved, allowing operators to serve a much more premium coffee brand will maintain and champion the values it offering,” she says. and the country are known for.

“Because these types of stores were retail environments and could stay open through COVID “We deliver great customer service in while others had to close, they got new customers. People who wouldn’t usually go to that location Ireland. We may not always appreciate it while for coffee realised the quality they could get and became more comfortable with it.” we’re here, but we miss it when we go overseas,” Bewley’s was the first coffee company in Ireland to introduce fully automatic machines, and was Dowling says. again the first to offer a plant-based milk solution through one.

“Ireland was a little late to become part of the Dowling expects these trends to continue to grow in the future, particularly automation. She also coffee scene in Europe. When we did, however, sees functionality playing a bigger role, as well as a focus on sustainability and traceability. we jumped into a more developed industry, “People are now interested in the health benefits of coffee and how it can be a positive part of their which meant we could focus on education and lifestyle. Functional coffees will probably explode in the next few years, and as time goes on, it wouldn’t taking it further.” G C R

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I N C LU S IVE FR E E LI STI N G

2021 MANUFACTURING GUIDE In the May/June edition of Global Coffee Report, we celebrate the craft masters behind the curtains: the manufacturers of the global coffee industry, with an inclusive free listing of espresso machines, super automatics, capsules brewers, grinders, milk dispensing units, tampers, vending models, roasters, fillers and sealers, coffee packaging, and more.

If you or your business is in the manufacturing game, then don’t miss your chance to have your name, company, country or service, email and website included in this free listing opportunity.

Advertising opportunities are available for greater exposure. Have your product or service front and centre in GCR’s one-stop-shop guide that’s sure to become a valuable business reference.

FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT Global Coffee Report, Business Development Manager Courtney Walker courtney.walker@primecreative.com.au

DIARY Dashboard COFFEE COFFEE AROUND AROUND THE THE GLOBE GLOBE

GLOBAL COFFEE EVENTS

COFFEE TEA CACAO RUSSIAN EXPO 2021

MOSKVA, RUSSIA 11 – 13 MARCH 2 02 1

BANGKOK, THAILAND 2 5 – 2 9 MAY 2 02 1

For the eighth time, the Coffee Tea Cacao Russian Expo (CTCRE), a leading business exhibition and conference, will take place in Moscow in March, bringing together professionals from the coffee, tea, and cocoa/chocolate industries. Opening its doors at the Music Media Dom venue, CTCRE will present for the first time a hybrid format of the event, which will be complemented by a virtual space. coffeetearusexpo.ru/en

Strong participation from the local community and international businesses from Poland, Indonesia, Italy, the United States, Korea, Norway, and Brazil reaffirms face-to-face interaction as irreplaceable for the F&B industry. www.thaifex-anuga.com

MELBOURNE INTERNATIONAL

HOST MILANO MILAN, ITALY

COFFEE EXPO 2021 MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA

9 – 11 S E PTE M B E R 2 02 1 The Melbourne International Coffee Expo (MICE) is known throughout the Asia-Pacific as the largest and most exciting dedicated coffee event. Each year, café owners, roasters, baristas, equipment manufacturers, service providers, and more gather at this trade-oriented event to network and do business.

MICE2021 will take place at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre. www.internationalcoffeeexpo.com

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22 – 26 OCTOBER 2021 Host Milano is a world-leading trade fair dedicated to the catering and hospitality sector that brings professionals together. It features the latest products and innovation in terms of equipment and raw materials, a busy schedule of events, and a suite of coffee and product competitions and awards. Host Milano will take place at Fieramilano.

Its format combines vertical specialisation with supply chain affinity, offering an international overview of changes, consumption models, and new formats in the hospitality world. The 2021 event will mark the 42nd edition, with technology taking centre stage. host.fieramilano.it/en/

WORLD OF COFFEE

ATHENS, GREECE 24 – 2 6 J U N E 2 02 1 Travelling to a different European city every edition, World of Coffee is an essential event for coffee professionals – drawing a loyal audience from the global specialty coffee community. Organised by the Specialty Coffee Association, 2021’s event will host hundreds of exhibitors, several World Coffee Championships, and the Best New Product and Design Lab awards. www.worldofcoffee.org

SPECIALTY COFFEE EXPO

LOUISIANA, UNITED STATES 30 SEPTEMBER – 3 OCTOBER 2021 The Specialty Coffee Expo was designed to be the coffee professional’s one stop shop for everything they need to succeed in the coffee industry. As the industry’s standard setter, the SCA has built a solid reputation over the last 30 years of providing the most up to date, qualified information and providing members the tools to succeed. The 2021 event will feature Design Lab, an interactive exhibit concept, as well as the Best New Product competition, Certified Home Brewer display and Roaster Village, highlighting some of America’s best roasters. www.coffeeexpo.org

WORLD COFFEE PRODUCERS FORUM

KIGALI, RWANDA 14 – 15 J U LY 2 02 1 The third biennial World Coffee Producers Forum will unite coffee producers, industry leaders, and economists to address issues impacting the coffee value chain. Event organisers are expecting more than 1500 attendees from 40 coffee producing countries to participate in the event.

TAIWAN INTERNATIONAL COFFEE SHOW

TAI PE I, TAIWAN

19 – 22 NOVEMBER 2021 The Taiwan International Coffee Show brings together coffee and related products/services and is the country’s sole international and business-to-business coffee industry exhibition. In 2021, the events will host the World Latte Art Championship, World Coffee In Good Spirits Championship, and World Coffee Roasting Championship. www.chanchao.com.tw/coffee

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PRODUCTS Marketplace

CLEAN BEAN CAPSULE CLEANING SYSTEM Without regular cleaning, capsule coffee machines can develop an oily coffee residue which taints the flavour of your coffee. Using the Clean Bean® Capsule Coffee Machine Cleaning System by Cafetto weekly helps keep coffee tasting great, and your machine running smoothly. The Clean Bean® Capsule Coffee Machine Cleaning System uses a unique clover-shaped tablet that cleans the brewing chamber and delivery spout in Nespresso® compatible machines.

The product is phosphate- and GMO-free and can clean your capsule machine in just two minutes.

For more information, visit www.cafetto.com Nespresso® is a registered trademark of the respective owners and is not associated with Cafetto® or Clean Bean®.

E’4M X-WIDE SUPER TRADITIONAL Eversys has developed a new line of leading-edge coffee machines under the company moniker of Super Traditional (ST) coffee equipment. This innovative range has been inspired by conventional design aesthetics, functionality, productivity as well as premium in-cup quality.

The new E’4m x-wide/ST shares identical features to the E’4m/ST machine, but it has been designed with a wider body of 84 centimetres instead of 56 centimetres to allow two baristas to use the machine simultaneously, producing espresso and milk based concoctions without interfering with one another.

This machine is designed to produce 350 espresso or cappuccino beverages per hour, and is also suitable for self-service environments.

The E’4m x-wide/ST is a true master at work.

For more information, visit www.eversys.com/en

FRANKE A300 Little space, but high demands on coffee quality? The Franke Coffee Systems A300 is a professional, compact and fully automatic coffee machine that adapts to any location and enables your entry into the premium segment.

It delivers excellent beverage quality and features Franke’s FoamMasterTM option, a professional milk and milk foam system, unique to this entry-level class which can be used to produce warm milk as well as milk foam to individually adjustable consistency.

The interactive eight-inch touchscreen displays customised menus from six to 20 beverages with the Quick-Select operating mode. The display system is already configured for Franke’s Digital Services, including Franke Touchless Ordering. EasyClean system ensures perfect hygiene.

With up to 100 different beverage specialities, the A300 offers a huge selection of beverages to suit every taste. Thanks to the patented heating system, different brewing temperatures can be set for different beverages.

A300: Great coffee experience – small footprint For more information, visit coffee.franke.com 56

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UNIKA CAPSULE FILLING AND SEALING MACHINE Unika is the brand new modular capsule filling and sealing machine from Ima Coffee Packaging that strikes a balance between performance and practicality. The modular construction design allows high flexibility in achieving custom-made solutions for almost any kind of product.

Depending on the machine configuration, Unika is able to reach up to 600 capsules per minute.

For those that require maximum flexibility for all capsule types, accessibility to boost production efficiency, quality dosing, and the ability to handle a broad variety of additional needs, Unika is a unique solution.

It places the user at the forefront of coffee capsule processing.

As with the majority of Ima solutions, customisation capabilities are far-reaching. Engineers who are familiar with their clients’ processes can tailor each detail to suit their objectives.

For more information, visit ima.it/en

DARK ROAST AND PROFILE DESIGNER Neuhaus Neotec has added two new features to its RFB roaster family that further expand its profile design possibilities.

Very dark roasts can produce critical amounts of carbon monoxide (CO) in the roasting chamber.

The Dark Roast safety package controls the roasting process, so CO levels remain in the non-critical range. A monitoring instrument detects increases in CO concentration at an early stage and a precise air flap system in the roasting circuit ensures necessary dilution of the atmosphere, ensuring roasts run safely without affecting the profiles.

The Profile Designer software module enables previously unattainable roasting profiles to be mapped.

Similar to the Dark Roast module, it uses a sophisticated flap control system for very fast changes in energy management and extends the advantages of the low thermal inertia of the RFB system.

Dark Roast and Profile Designer are available individually or can be combined in one option package.

For more information, visit www.neuhaus-neotec.de/en

SPIN COLD BREW Swiss start-up Mastercoldbrewer has developed a radically new method for cold brew coffee: Spin Cold Brew. This method involves the milling of whole coffee beans together with cold water, followed by phase separation via decanter.

This continuously running, patented technology, extracts more aroma and at the same time reduces process time from hours to minutes. Under the brand RE-Coffee, the first cold brew products have been launched in the Swiss market and the company has just received the granted patents in the United States. The next innovation is fully dedicated to differentiating in taste. Instead of co-milling the coffee beans with cold water, they are milled together with other ingredients like fruits, milk, nuts, spices, etc. Compared to simply mixing coffee with these ingredients, Spin Cold Brew delivers totally new taste sensations, allowing clear differentiation in the highly competitive RTD Coffee beverage market.

For more information, visit re-coffee.ch/en

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LAST WORD 2020 SCTG

Guiding light

A

THE 2020 SPECIALTY COFFEE TRANSACTION GUIDE PROVIDES INSIGHT TO THE STATE OF A SOMETIMES MYSTERIOUS SEGMENT OF THE MARKET.

s commodity coffee prices continue to sit at unprofitable levels for many producers, some members of the specialty coffee industry have considered the need to separate their price references from the commercial market.

In 2018, 21 of these companies – including roasters, importers, and exporters – provided data on more than 10,000 contracts to Transparent Trade Coffee (TTC), a team of researchers at Emory University led by Dr. Peter Roberts and Chad Trewick of Reciprocafé.

These contracts covered around 68,000 tonnes of green coffee, with an overall value exceeding US$340 million, and served as the basis for the first edition of the Specialty Coffee Transaction Guide (SCTG).

The guide is a collaboration between researchers from Transparent Trade Coffee at Emory University, and a growing roster of specialty coffee producers, exporters, importers, roasters, and supporters. It is designed to provide specialty coffee roasters and importers with a more relevant information source than commodity indices to use as part of their independent pricing strategies.

Released annually, the SCTG has grown every year, with the 2020 edition collating information on green coffee prices and buying from 81 data donors covering 494,415 tonnes valued at US$2.1 billion.

Five Senses Coffee in Australia is one of the donors. Its Director of Coffee, Matt Slater, former International Director of the Re:Co Symposium for World Coffee Events and the Specialty Coffee Association, says the SCTG fosters a greater level of openness and trust in the coffee industry.

“Green coffee prices have historically been determined by commodity price references. In most cases, these prices do not cover the full cost of production and go nowhere near what is needed to support the livelihoods of coffee farmers and their families,” Slater says.

“The Transaction Guide is a move away from using the current commodity price as a starting point for price discovery and allows an informed discussion around the true ‘value’ of a coffee, taking into account variables such as quality and lot size.”

The 2020 SCTG lists US$2.60 per pound as the median middle free-on-board price paid for specialty coffee in coffee year 2019/2020. This is down 15 US cents from the 2018/2019 coffee year, which the guide suggests was caused by a move from higher-quality, more expensive coffees towards higher-volume and lower-scoring specialty coffees.

Within the 25th percentile (lowest quarter of prices) the median was US$1.90 per pound, in-line with the year prior. In the 75th percentile (highest quarter of prices) the median was $3.50 per pound, six US cents down on 2018/2019.

According to the 2020 SCTG, in each harvest year, the range of prices paid for green specialty coffees is quite large. In 2019/2020, 50 per cent of the prices in the sample covered a range of US$1.60 – from US$1.90 to US$3.50. When it comes to quality, in 2019/2020, the median price for coffees with scores from 86-87.9 range was US$3.50 per pound, 84 per cent higher than the median price for 82-83.9 coffees, at US$1.90 per pound. For lower-quality coffees, the lower prices declined in 2018/2019, but then rebounded in 2019/2020.

Another factor influencing prices was lot size, with smaller lots and quantities earning higher prices per pound. In 2019/2020, the median price per pound for lots of less than 1000 pounds, US$4, was more than double that paid for lots of more than 40,000 pounds, US$1.90.

The guide estimates that roughly 6 per cent of specialty coffee produced over the last three harvest

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Matt Slater is the Director of Coffee for Five Senses and former International Director of the Re:Co Symposium.

years is included in the 2020 SCTG. Trewick reflects on the growing utility of the Guide, saying that as participation and awareness of the Guide grows, we increasingly know the value specialty coffees hold in the market.

“These prices must be accessible by producers as well as buyers of green coffee,” he says. “This is critical as the industry seeks to understand the economic potential specialty coffee represents in the context of supporting producer livelihoods and maintaining access to a diversified supply of green coffee upholding both ethical and quality standards.”

Some of the many data donors of the 2020 SCTG include Café Imports, Campos Coffee, Caravela, Cedro Alto, Counter Culture Coffee, Cup of Excellence, Hasbean Coffee, Intelligentsia, Olam Specialty Coffee, Onyx Coffee Roasters, Ozone Coffee, Stumptown Roasters, Sucafina Specialty, Sustainable Harvest, Tim Wendelboe, Union Hand-Roasted, and Verve Coffee Roasters. G C R For more information, www.transactionguide.coffee

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