100% of Costa Rica coffee is of the Arabica species, of the Caturra and Catuaí varieties, which produces a higher quality bean and a cup with better organoleptic characteristics: pleasant, aromatic and fine. Since 1989, the planting of Robusta coffee due to inferior cup quality has been prohibited by law. In addition, Catimores, which are highly productive, were no longer cultivated to preserve cup quality.
Fertile soils of volcanic origin
Our coffee is grown in fertile soils of volcanic origin and low acidity, ideal conditions for its production. More than 80% of the coffee-growing area is located between 800 and 1,600 meters of altitude and in temperatures between 17º and 28º C., with annual rainfall between 2,000 and 3,000 millimeters.
Since 2001, the Costa Rican Coffee Institute, ICAFE, on behalf of the sector, launched the National Coffee Plan with actions that improve the conditions in which coffee is produced, processed and marketed.
The advanced technology that the Costa Rican coffee producer has used for more than 200 years has allowed him to adapt the plantations to the characteristics of each zone. Today, Costa Rican coffee is grown in 8 producing areas: Brunca, Turrialba, Tres Ríos, Orosi, Tarrazú, Central and Western Valleys, and Guanacaste.
Quality Improvement Agreement
The manual and selective collection method is used: only the mature variety are chosen (in optimum maturation); this allows a better washing of the coffee. Each coffee-growing region of Costa Rica signed a Quality Improvement Agreement in which the owners of the processing companies have committed to receiving and processing only ripe fruit, which guarantees better cup quality.
The Costa Rican coffee sector only uses wet milling, in which the pulp is removed the same day the grain is harvested. Also, the classification and cleaning, after the removal of the pulp, is done before the fermentation process, with the idea of eliminating the remaining pulp and removing possible defective grains.
In the Costa Rican beneficiation process, sun drying is used, one of the most demanded systems in the most demanding world markets; the process lasts 7 days. Mechanical drying is also used which reduces the optimum dry point time (12% humidity) to only 24 hours.
A worldwide winner
As another sign of the quality of Costa Rican coffee, in 2007 the first cupping competition was organized, from which 10 of the best coffees were selected as winners. Three of them were selected by an expert jury during the CuppingPavilion competition of the United States Association of Fine Coffees.
Differentiated Settlements are also part of these actions aimed at achieving quality. To encourage the production, processing and marketing of higher quality coffee, the registration, verification, control and monitoring of a grain marketing process with differentiated characteristics was established.
The participating beneficiary firms agree to receive, process, dry, store and market the grain totally separated from the rest processed in a conventional manner. In addition, to pay for it with a differentiated settlement, with prices higher than those of conventional coffee. The differences in prices are significant.
The goal of the Costa Rican coffee sector is to continue increasing the sale of the bean in the fine coffee markets; maintain the strategy of “emphasis on quality and not quantity”; always provide added value to our coffee and to increase participation in the local market with quality coffees.
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