What Is Kopi Luwak and How Does Civet Coffee Differ?

Kopi Luwak is coffee made from beans that civets eat and pass through their digestive tract. In Indonesian, kopi means coffee and luwak refers to the civet. Wild civets select ripe cherries naturally, which is why the coffee drew attention, but commercial demand turned it into an expensive novelty, with a cup selling for over a thousand yuan in some restaurants.

Rising civet coffee demand could not be met by wild animals, so many producers caged civets and fed them only unripe cherries, despite the animals being naturally omnivorous. Palm civets, members of the same family, were later forced into the same production line. The distinction matters because wild-sourced and caged production differ sharply in animal welfare.

Kopi Luwak has always been one of the most talked-about phenomena in the coffee world—it originates from wild civets naturally selecting ripe coffee cherries, yet it was elevated to cult status through commercial hype. To meet skyrocketing demand, civets were imprisoned en masse, and palm civets were also forced into the "poop production" line. This article will systematically sort through the definition of Kopi Luwak, its history, the essential differences between it and palm civet coffee, and the disturbing animal welfare and industry development truths behind it, helping you view this expensive and controversial coffee rationally.

Whenever the word "poop" comes up while eating, most people's first reaction is "how disgusting." But interestingly, humans show astonishing double standards in quite a few matters—switch to "Kopi Luwak," and the reaction is completely different, with some even having their eyes light up: "Oh? Kopi Luwak? That must be expensive!"

Because of this, merchants around the world have set their sights on the "civet poop" gimmick, precisely targeting the public's curiosity, importing Kopi Luwak into their own countries, and harvesting the market year after year. In some restaurants, a cup of Kopi Luwak can sell for over a thousand yuan. Expensive? But there are always people willing to pay for curiosity.

The name itself is enough to spark curiosity, and more and more people want to drink Kopi Luwak. To meet this demand, people began targeting the civets that produce Kopi Luwak, and the palm civets—members of the same family as civets—could not escape the fate of being caged for "poop production" either.

Kopi Luwak was originally coffee for the poor, but because of an article published in National Geographic, it quickly became famous worldwide. In the local Indonesian language, Kopi Luwak refers to civet coffee, where Kopi means coffee and Luwak refers to the civet.

After round after round of commercial hype, something that was originally almost worthless suddenly saw demand skyrocket. However, wild civets produce coffee beans far too slowly, unable to keep up with people's desires, so many locals began capturing civets and locking them up, feeding them only unripe coffee cherries—bear in mind that civets are naturally omnivores—to increase Kopi Luwak production.

Later, locals discovered that besides civets, palm civets could also produce similarly effective coffee beans after eating coffee cherries, so palm civets were imprisoned as well. Combined with various packaging and deliberate concealment, the concept of Kopi Luwak has long been swapped by many—palm civet coffee equals civet coffee...

Authentic Kopi Luwak is produced when wild civets treat coffee cherries as an after-dinner dessert, so they only pick fully ripe coffee cherries to eat. But naturally produced Kopi Luwak has extremely low yields. So someone came up with an idea: capture civets in the wild, lock them in narrow cages, and feed them only coffee cherries.

But wild civets are extremely few in number, so many merchants found palm civets—which belong to the same Viverridae family as civets in appearance—as substitutes. It should be noted that civets and palm civets are only animals of the same family; they are not the same species.

Perhaps because PETA previously released a video exposing scenes of caged civets and palm civets, revealing that so-called wild Kopi Luwak actually comes from caged felines, this cruel practice began to receive attention, and people started boycotting Kopi Luwak.

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Or perhaps because some scientists pointed out that Viverridae animals are one of the hosts of the novel coronavirus, causing panic. The East India Company (not the one founded in 1600, but a coffee trading company founded by a coffee merchant in 1987, which applied in 1990 to use the coat of arms of the original East India Company as its trademark), which had been trading Kopi Luwak for many years, recently announced: it will no longer sell Kopi Luwak and has delisted it. However, most of the reasons are still related to the decline in consumer spending after the pandemic and people starting to pay attention to wildlife protection.

Due to a monotonous diet, cramped living conditions, and even having to share the same space with their own feces, these small felines have more or less developed mental problems; some even began biting their own tails, causing open wounds that go untreated and are left exposed. Local workers also admit that these felines indeed have mental health problems, and the wounds are from their own gnawing. Some also admit that the so-called wild source is merely wild animals kept in captivity, and the number of Kopi Luwak beans actually found in the wild is extremely scarce.

Does Kopi Luwak taste good? Force-feeding Viverridae animals unripe coffee cherries, combined with these animals living in Indonesia's lower-altitude forests.

Coffee grown at low altitudes, plus cherries processed before they ripen—if you say it tastes good, even you wouldn't believe it.

Image source: Internet

Video source: PETA UK's YouTube channel

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The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.