Coffee and Africa

Posted on Feb 16, 2012

Coffee and Africa

Africa is part of the “cradle of civilization.” It’s also part of the cradle of coffee, considering that the original coffee plants were native to northeastern Africa even before coffee became a popular drink and something to be cultivated worldwide.

As legend states, it was an Ethiopian goat-herder named Kaldi who first noticed the energizing effects of coffee beans when his goat became rambunctious after chewing on the berries of a Robusta plant. Although other legends put the origins of coffee in Arabia, it’s hard to deny that Africa’s importance in the history of coffee is as integral as the ideas of roasting or brewing.

So what does single-origin coffee from Africa look like today, and how did it get that way? What is it about single-origin coffees from Africa that make African-grown coffee distinct from coffees grown in Asia or South America? Throughout this section, we’ll explore exactly what it is that African-originating coffee different from its counterparts across the globe.