Senior Program Manager for Coffee at IDH, the Sustainable Trade Initiative, METTE-MARIE HANSEN shares key insights from the recently published report, The Grounds for Sharing. The report was commissioned by the Global Coffee Platform, IDH, and Solidaridad and traces how value for coffees sold in the German retail sector is created and distributed along supply chains.

EILEEN GORDON-LAITY, Secretary General of the European Coffee Federation, shares what we know (and what we don’t know) about the EU Deforestation Regulation coming into effect in the future.

Researchers Dr. NANCY CORDOBA and Dr. DEVIN PETERSON, joined by PETER GIULIANO, share early results of a multi-year Coffee Science Foundation research project, undertaken at the Flavor Research and Education Center at Ohio State University, to establish foundational knowledge about the phenomenon of sweetness in coffee.

Director of the University of California Davis Coffee Center, Professor WILLIAM RISTENPART shares a summary of a four-year-long project on cold brew.

World Coffee Research’s MAEVE HOLLER and Dr. ROBERT KAWUKI write about how the organization is fast-tracking innovation for robusta to forge the future of coffee. 

Despite entering my sixth year of editing 25, I’m (somehow) still astonished at the organic way the editorial team often ends up with some kind of unifying link between all the features despite our best efforts to avoid any “theming” at the start of each cycle.

MARY BASCO, SCA Research and Knowledge Development Programs Manager, outlines the Coffee Science Foundation’s 2024-2025 Research Agenda and outlines which research projects are on the horizon.

Commodity market analyst JUDY GANES explains the Intercontinental Exchange grading process and considers how recent changes to this practice, which results in exchange-certified coffee and impacts levels of “certified stock,” are likely to impact C market dynamics.

SCA Sustainability Director, ANDRÉS MONTENEGRO, writes an “after action review” on the SCA’s Equitable Value Distribution Survey tool, offering insights into its process, highlighting key elements from its results, and providing early insights into how these results will impact the SCA’s Sustainable Coffee Agenda.  

University of California Davis Coffee Center scientists LAUDIA ANOKYE-BEMPAH, IRWIN R. DONIS-GONZÁLEZ, and WILLIAM D. RISTENPART describe research undertaken in 2023 with a goal of developing new roast color standards for the coffee industry.

Drs. JOSHUA MÉNDEZ HARPER and CHRISTOPHER H. HENDON discuss the chemistry and physics behind the electrification of coffee during grinding, its effect on extraction, and strategies to mitigate it. All images are adapted from their recent academic publication “Moisture-Controlled Triboelectrification During Coffee Grinding,” published in Matter.

Corresponding author MATEUS MANFRIN ARTÊNCIO shares the findings of a recent paper, “The Impact of Coffee Origin Information on Sensory and Hedonic Judgment of Fine Amazonian Robusta Coffee,” published in the Journal of Sensory Studies, confirming the significant influence of origin information on the sensory perception of professional coffee tasters.  

ALEXA ROMANO explores the emergence of specialty coffee culture as an embedded subculture within the broader coffee industry, and how the resulting shift from passive to active consumption asks us to rethink the consumer’s role in value creation and distribution.

If you’ve been following along with the SCA’s project to evolve the 2004 cupping system into a Coffee Value Assessment, there’s a good chance you’re already aware of the importance of extrinsic, or symbolic, attributes.

The Specialty Coffee Association is the world’s largest coffee membership association, with a sustainability-driven purpose deeply ingrained in its structure as a non-profit trade organization: to make coffee better.

SARAH CHARLES, writer, Communications Officer at the International Trade Centre, and author of a recent dissertation on mandatory supply chain due diligence, outlines the history, opportunities, and challenges of regulatory sustainability approaches while offering a path forward for coffee businesses grappling with the shift from a voluntary to a regulatory approach.

Neuroscientist Dr. FABIANA CARVALHO shares the recent results of a Coffee Science Foundation study, supported by Savor Brands Inc., to understand how packaging color influences consumer behavior.

Economists DAVIDE DEL PRETE and ROCCO MACCHIAVELLO recently completed a literature review of sustainability interventions for the Coffee Science Foundation; here, with PETER GIULIANO, they summarize its findings.

Cognitive psychologist BENTE KLEIN HAZEBROEK and language professor ILJA CROIJMANS explore the role and construction of coffee’s linguistic descriptions—those flavor notes and descriptions across coffee packaging and websites!—in a consumer’s willingness to pay.

NOA BERGER explores how the “field” of coffee was inspired by (and inspires) related industries like fine wine, cacao, and—more recently—vanilla, and queries its impacts.