by Barbara Guess

Created on: August 08, 2008   Last Updated: December 01, 2011

The coffee bean is really the seed of the coffee plant, a tree that belongs to the genus Coffea. It is an evergreen shrub or small tree, with broad dark green leaves, fragrant white flowers that grow in clusters and oval, red berries containing the coffee seeds or beans. On coffee plantations the trees are kept pruned to a suitable height for harvesting and this ensures a high yield.

The region of the world lying between the latitudes of 23 degrees North and 25 degrees South provide the optimum conditions for the coffee tree to flourish. These are tropical and sub-tropical regions with an average temperature of 20 degrees Celsius, fertile soil and plenty of rainfall.

The largest coffee producer in the world is Brazil, producing around 28 per cent of the total world output.

The quality of the beans is also affected by altitude. Coffee beans grown higher in the mountains, on plantations at an altitude of 600 to 1800 metres above sea level, where there is less oxygen, take longer to ripen and this allows the flavour to develop more fully.

There are two predominant species of coffee plant, Coffea Arabica, Arabica and Coffea Canephora, Robusta. The best coffee being arabica, a well-flavoured, aromatic coffee with less cafeine than Robusta, grown high in the mountains in the belt between the latitudes of 10 degrees North and 10 degrees South of the equator. This is the oldest, most widely cultivated species of bean in the world, commanding the highest prices due to higher production costs as it is more labour intensive.

As they become ripe Arabica berries have to be harvested immediately, otherwise they fall from the tree and can become tainted or spoiled by contact with the earth.

Robusta grows at lower altitudes and is more tolerant to climatic changes, it is also more disease resistant, matures in half the time of the Arabica variety and produces twice the number of berries. When the Robusta berries ripen they remain on the tree so immediate harvesting is unnecessary. This means that Robusta is cheaper to produce, being used as an inexpensive substitute for Arabica in commercial blends. Some Espresso blends are made with good quality Robustas as they create a better foam and the ingredients are less expensive.

It takes five or six years for a coffee seed to grow to full maturity, producing its first full crop of coffee cherries.

In the mountain regions of the rain forest the first farmers grew their coffee trees where taller trees formed a canopy overhead, providing

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