The Pilgrimage of Kona Coffee
"Kona coffee has a richer flavor than any other, be it grown
where it may and call it by what name you please."
-Mark Twain, 1866
It has been many years since Reverend Samuel Ruggles brought the first coffee plant cuttings to Kealakekua-Kona, Hawaii. The cuttings were taken from plants growing at the home of chief boki, governor of Oahu, who with help from agriculturalist, John Wilkinson, brought back several young plants acquired in Rio de Janeiro during a royal British voyage taken in 1825.
Even though coffee was in Kona in 1828 it was not immediately seen as a viable agricultural commodity. However, the particular conditions in Kona's climate and soil turned out to be some of the best known in the world for growing coffee. The sheltered and fertile western slopes of Mauna Loa and Mt. Hualalai along with sunny mornings and gentle afternoon rains helped the coffee plant thrive in its new environment. Soon enough coffee caught on in Kona, and its distinguished flavor became known throughout the world. In July of 1866 Mark Twain stated, in his "Letters From Hawaii", Kona coffee has a richer flavor than any other, be it grown where it may and call it by what name you please."
It was not until the late 1800's, the period following the California gold rush, that the coffee industry in Kona saw its first boom. In 1898 the Kona hillsides were consumed by coffee trees; over three million of them spread out over six thousand acres.
 In the late 1800's and early 1900's the initial steps involved with processing the coffee were in most cases undertaken by the independent farmers themselves. This involved hand-powered pulpers, a sixteen hour soaking period and drying the beans under "false" pitched roofs that rolled back to receive the warm sunlight. Local mills in Kona then removed the final parchment membranes and loaded the grated beans into sacks before being carried down the mountain in mule powered freight wagons. The last leg of the journey began at either Kailua or Napoopoo piers where the coffee was shuttled by boats out of waiting steamships bound for San Francisco.
Today, very little has changed from the coffee culture in Kona as many of its farms continue to be owned and operated by independent families. There are now mills in the area that fully process the raw coffee cherries for brew guaranteeing that the hand picked beans get the full flavored roast they deserve, right here in Kona, Hawaii.
COFFEE TODAY
For North Americans, the world's largest consumers, Seattle is the new spiritual home of coffee. The wettest major city in the USA gave birth in the 1970s to a café or 'Latte' culture which swept the USA and has dramatically improved the general quality of the coffee Americans drink. Today, any public place in the USA will have one or more coffee carts, serving a variety of coffees, drinks and snacks. This new found 'coffee culture' has started to spread to the rest of the world. To those countries with great coffee traditions of their own, such as Italy, Germany, and Scandinavia, added new converts to the pleasures of good coffee. Today it is possible to find good coffee in every major city of the world, from London to Sydney to Tokyo; tomorrow the world will drink more and more importantly, better coffee.
COFFEE IS A GLOBAL COMMODITY
The importance of coffee in the world economy cannot be overstated. It is one of the most valuable primary products in world trade, in many years second in value only to oil as a source of foreign exchange to developing countries. Its cultivation, processing, trading, transportation and marketing provide employment for millions of people worldwide. Coffee is crucial to the economies and politics of many developing countries; for many of the world's Least Developed Countries, exports of coffee account for a substantial part of their foreign exchange earnings in some cases over 80%. Coffee is a traded commodity on major futures and commodity exchanges, most importantly in London and New York.
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