RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PRODUCTIVITY AND INTEGRAL BEAN QUALITY IN ADVANCED SELECTIONS OF ROBUSTA COFFEE (Coffea canephora) IN ECUADOR

Abstract

The international industry of instant (or soluble) coffee has had rapid growth and the demand for Robusta (Coffea canephora) coffee beans, an essential raw material for this market, has increased 3.58 % from 2001 to 2013. In Ecuador, efforts in genetic improvement led to identification of highyielding genotypes. Nevertheless, information about physical, chemical and organoleptic characteristics of the fruits is scarce. The objective of this study was to group selections of Ecuadorian C. canephora by production variables and physical, chemical and organoleptic characteristics. The data used corresponds to 25 plants from five clones in production for three years. The experimental unit was 1 kg green coffee of each genotype. The results showed that the conversion rate from coffee cherry to green coffee was statistically similar among the individuals. One characteristic of commercial interest was the higher content of sucrose, relative to fructose and glucose in all the genotypes. The individuals with higher production of coffee cherries had more physical defects in the green coffee beans. The multivariate analysis showed that coffee cherry, moisture content, defects and percentage caffeine were the variables that contributed most to differentiation. Fourteen of the 25 individuals evaluated had high organoleptic quality and, therefore, are considered fine coffee.