Coffee has had a significant impact on Brazil’s social and economic history, development, and insertion in the world market. In 1727, Francisco de Melo Palheta introduced the coffee plant to Brazil, where it found favorable soil and climatic conditions for adaptation and expansion throughout the country.
With more than two centuries of experience trading green coffee in the international market, Brazil is the largest producer and exporter of green coffee beans in the world. Green coffee comprises 5.4% of Brazil’s total agribusiness exports. According to Cecafé —the Council of Brazilian Coffee Exporters—Brazilian coffee is consumed in over 120 countries.
Minas Gerais is the top coffee-growing state in Brazil, responsible for more than half of its total production of green coffee beans. Atlantica Coffee’s sourcing offices are strategically located in two of Minas Gerais’ main coffee-growing regions: Matas de Minas and South Minas. Green is how Brazilian coffee crossed borders to conquer the world.
What are green coffee beans?
Green coffee, also known as “unroasted” or “raw” coffee, refers to coffee beans that have not been roasted or ground. The beans are obtained from coffee cherries after they have been peeled and dried. Once roasted and ground, they are brewed to create the beverage we enjoy. Prior to roasting, coffee beans are very hard, light green in color, and have a bitter, unpleasant taste.
Chemical transformations take place during the roasting process that not only change the color of the beans and increase their volume, but also produce the compounds responsible for coffee’s seductive flavor and aroma.
Attributes of green coffee beans
Compared to roasted, ground coffee, green coffee is by far the best way to maintain coffee quality. After roasting, coffee undergoes chemical and physio-chemical changes that significantly alter its sensory properties. With time, it begins to lose quality.
During grinding, the rupture of cells and the loss of cellular components increases the coffee’s surface area and its contact with oxygen, accelerating the process of oxidation and causing a loss in quality. The shelf life of roasted and ground coffee is much shorter than that of whole green coffee beans.
Advantages of exporting green coffee beans
Storage and export
One of the advantages of selling green coffee beans for export is their ability to better preserve the flavors and aromas of the beans, allowing for longer storage life and transport over great distances.
Coffee quality
Grading: the evaluation of coffee’s color, classification, screen size, number of defects, and visual aspects is only possible with green beans. The smell of green coffee offers the first hints of the final quality of the beverage.
Prior to roasting, it is also possible to visually identify the post-harvest processing to which the coffee has undergone. Appearance is an important indicator of the quality of a lot and is related to the complexity, body, intensity, acidity, uniformity, and sweetness of a coffee.
Dry-processed (natural) coffees are distinguished by a central brown skin and a green bean, while wet-processed (washed) coffees tend to have a silver skin and a bluish color. A uniform color both denotes a good appearance and serves as a reliable indicator of the quality of the drying process.
Variety of roasts
Once they reach their markets, green coffee beans can be subjected to many different roasting styles. Light, medium, or dark roasts—coffee preferences vary from country to country, region to region, and person to person! The level of roasting can highlight or conceal the properties of the selected coffee beans.
Proper roasting brings out the best flavors, aromas, and acidity of each coffee. Regardless of how they are roasted, our green Arabica coffees combine natural Brazilian aromas and exceptional flavors with internationally recognized certifications.
Atlantica’s Green Coffees
Proudly hailing from Minas Gerais, Atlantica Coffee is a company of the Montesanto Tavares Group (GMT). Our coffee lines are composed exclusively of green Arabica coffee beans. Since 2000, we have brought green coffee beans to the world from the most traditional coffee-growing regions of Brazil, the largest producer and exporter of coffee on the planet.
Atlantica Coffee operates primarily in the trade and export of our precious green Arabica coffee beans. Green is the manner in which we buy, taste, classify, store, transport, and export our coffee beans. Our coffees pass through strict requirements before joining our main commercial lines in order to ensure that our clients have the best experience with Brazilian coffee.
In addition to growing coffee on GMT farms, we also buy green coffee from small Brazilian farmers, allowing us to offer a wide variety of coffee to our clients and reinforce family coffee-growing traditions.
Atlantica Coffee unites ethics with exceptional green coffee, fast service, and continual innovation. A close, enduring relationship of trust between growers, clients, and partners who are all members of the Atlantica Coffee family.
