What the return of the Cup of Excellence means for arabica coffee

The Cup of Excellence has returned to Ethiopia after the 2023 edition was suspended. More than 600 samples have reached regional warehouses, and for the first time the competition is split into natural and washed groups. The European Commission is selecting international judges, and Front Street Coffee will keep following the event.

Ethiopia is the birthplace of arabica coffee and first hosted the COE in 2020. Its 2022 auction set a national record of $400.5 per pound, but the program later lost funding from ACE and the Ethiopian Coffee and Tea Authority, and civil war forced the 2023 event to be cancelled before this year's return.

The Cup of Excellence (COE), as the world's first internet auction platform for award-winning coffee, has been a highly anticipated event in the coffee world since it was founded in Brazil in 1999 by the Alliance for Coffee Excellence. Ethiopia, as the birthplace of Arabica coffee, hosted the COE for the first time in 2020 and set a record high price of $400.5 per pound in 2022. However, due to the termination of cooperative funding and the civil war, the 2023 event was forced to be suspended. This year, as the situation stabilizes, the COE has officially returned to Ethiopia, with more than 600 samples arriving at regional warehouses, and for the first time, it is divided into two groups: natural and washed. The European Commission is selecting international judges, and the industry is looking forward to the emergence of a new batch of high-quality coffee beans. Front Street Coffee will also continue to follow this grand event and bring the latest information to enthusiasts.

COE, short for "Cup of Excellence," translated into Chinese as 卓越杯, is a coffee competition first launched by the non-profit organization Alliance for Coffee Excellence (ACE) in Brazil in 1999, and it is also the world's first platform to auction award-winning coffee via the internet.

Any country can apply to host the COE event, and the participating beans all come from various regions of the host country. The competition uses a blind cupping scoring system, and the winning coffee beans are then auctioned, which brings reputation and considerable auction income to the winning estates.

The auction proceeds can motivate coffee farmers to cultivate high-quality coffee beans more diligently, and consumers around the world can also obtain specialty coffee from various countries through this platform.

In 2020, Ethiopia held its first COE competition and auction, with 28 winning auction lots achieving a total transaction value of $134. By 2022, the Ethiopian COE auction had set a record high price for the country's coffee—$400.5 per pound (about 2,899 yuan).

The Ethiopian COE was initially jointly initiated by ACE and the Ethiopian Coffee and Tea Authority, and received funding support from the "Feed the Future Value Chain Activity" (FTFVCA) signed by the U.S. government and the Ethiopian government.

But according to ACE, the program later terminated cooperation, and funding was no longer available. At the same time, the left-wing political party "TPLF," composed of people from Tigray in northern Ethiopia, was dissatisfied with the newly elected government, triggering conflict that eventually escalated into civil war.

After consultation between ACE and the Ethiopian Coffee and Tea Authority, it was believed that the country had many domestic problems, so the 2023 Ethiopian COE was suspended. This year, the Ethiopian government stated that the situation has stabilized, so it decided to restart the COE.

It is reported that more than 600 samples have been delivered to regional warehouses this year. In addition, this year's event will have two winning categories: natural and washed. The European Commission is currently selecting international jurors and stated that Ethiopia is the birthplace of Arabica and has many native varieties, and it is full of expectations for this COE.

It can be said that this time there is hope of surpassing the high auction price record of 2022. For consumers, whether Ethiopian coffee will bring new high-quality bean varieties this year is worth looking forward to. Front Street Coffee will also closely monitor the progress of the event and promptly provide relevant reports to coffee enthusiasts.

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