LET'S TALK ABOUT INDONESIAN COFFEE

To understand Indonesian coffee, it is essential to understand its geography, culture and history. Indonesia is the largest archipelago in the world, made up of more than 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi and parts of Borneo and New Guinea. With more than 278 million inhabitants, Indonesia is the fourth most populous country in the world and the most populous with a Muslim majority. Java, the most populous island in the world, is home to more than half of the country's population.

​The Dutch governor of Malabar (India) sent Arabica coffee seeds from Yemen to the Dutch governor of Batavia (present-day Jakarta) in 1696. The first seeds failed due to flooding. The second shipment of seeds was sent in 1699. The plants grew, and in 1711 the Dutch East India Company -VOC- sent the first exports from Java to Europe, reaching 1,000 kg shipped in 1717.

​In 2022, Indonesia produced approximately 13 million bags of coffee. It is the fifth largest producer in the world, although approximately 80% of the country's total production corresponds to Robusta coffee. The climate is ideal for growing coffee, one of the country's main agricultural export crops. Most of Indonesia's coffee growing area is located on the island of Sumatra. Almost all of Indonesia's coffee beans were grown on small farms scattered throughout the producing regions, posing logistical problems when harvesting and collecting the beans for export.
 
Sumatran coffee is exotic and complex, due to the large number of small producers and the "giling basah" (wet hulling) processing technique they use. The bean in Sumatra is not green, but has a distinctive bluish-grey colour, which is attributed to the processing method and lack of iron in the soil. Notes of cocoa, tobacco and cedar can appear markedly in the cup. Although higher quality coffees may show greater acidity, which gives them balance. This acidity takes on notes of tropical fruits.