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HAWAII'S KONA COFFEE BASIC FACTS

    Cultivated in every tropical and sub-tropical part of the world, Coffee is second only to oil in the value of its worldwide trade. Coffee Arabica is lower in caffeine content than Robusta and is prized for its fine aroma and taste. All specialty Coffee is Arabica.Most mass consumption Coffees (canned, pre-ground Coffee sold in U.S. supermarkets) are a blend of Robustas and more expensive Arabicas. There are dozens of well known specialty coffees, grown mostly in Columbia, Mexico, Central and South America, Indonesia, Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. Coffee cannot tolerate frost: witness the scarcity of Coffee in the early 1970's when frost in Brazil killed a major portion of the crop.

    Most Coffee is sold under the auspices of the International Coffee Organization (ICO), a cartel similar to OPEC, but including Coffee consuming as well as coffee producing countries. The ICO regulates the price of coffee on the world market by limiting the amount of Coffee growing countries may export.Each exporting country is allowed a quota of stamps, which must accompany coffee entering a consuming country. Consequently, there is a great deal of black market Coffee smuggled to countries which have more stamps than they can use. Non-quota coffee is also sold in non-member countries, principally in Eastern Europe. There is no limit to how much coffee any producing country can sell internationally.

    Several coffees command much higher prices than most Arabicas. Jamaican Blue Mountain typically sells for $40 per pound of green beans, while Kona Coffee sells for around $30, and Indonesian Celebes Kalossi for $10. Most other gourmet coffees sell for around $2.50 per pound of green beans, while Robustas sell for a quota price varying between $1.40 and 40 cents.

    Coffee trees are planted from seedlings and grow to peak production in five to seven years, with the first cherries appearing after three years. In Hawaii, the arrival of spring rains in March produce flowers (coffee blossoms). There are three to six flowerings each year. Eight to nine months after flowering the cherries turn red and are ready to harvest. Cherries must be hand picked and each tree must be harvested once for each flowering. Consequently, picking is the most difficult and labor intensive part of the coffee harvest. Once the cherries are picked, they are pulped to remove the seeds which are then dried in the sun. This process, called pulping, was once performed on almost every coffee farm. Now fewer than twenty per cent of the Kona Coffee farms have their own pulping facilities, and most farmers take their cherries to a central pulping facility. Mechanical dryers are employed by most companies to speed the drying process, although this produces a lesser quality product.

    The dried Coffee, called "parchment," is then brought to a parchment mill where large machines remove the parchment and grade the beans by size and density. Kona Coffee is graded into classifications of Extra Fancy, Fancy, Number One, Prime, and Unclassified (often called 3X). There is also a Peaberry classification for the 6% of cherries which form one round bean instead of two flat beans. Most of the green Coffee is exported by boat to the U.S. Mainland and Japan,where it is roasted and sold mostly in gourmet Coffee shops. About twenty per cent of the crop is sold within the State of Hawaii to tourists and restaurants. 

[Select a Coffee]100% Maui KaanapaliMaui PeaberryJamaican Blue Mountain GrownKona Fancy Kauai PeaberryMolokai Muleskinner PeaberryKona Prime Coffee Kona PeaberryKona Wailapa Organic Estate 100% Pure Kona Espresso ColumbianCelebesYemen MocaSumatraDecaf SumatraMaui Ono Farms Organic