Introduction:The results of the 2024 Ethiopia Cup of Excellence (COE) competition have been officially announced. All 27 winning coffees were sun-dried and all belong to the JARC numbered variety series, with the Sidama region particularly shining. This article will provide a detailed breakdown of the highlights of this year’s competition, including historical COE transaction records, the reasons for the 2023 cancellation, as well as the geographical advantages and growing conditions of the Bensa and Bona sub-regions within Sidama. This will help coffee enthusiasts gain a deeper understanding of the stories behind these top-tier coffees.
The list of winners for the 2024 Ethiopia Cup of Excellence (COE) competition has been officially released. This year’s event shows several notable trends: all 27 winning coffees were sun-dried and all belong to the JARC numbered variety series, with the Sidama region standing out the most.
Looking back to 2020, when Ethiopia first held the COE competition, there were 28 coffees up for auction, with a total transaction value of $1.34 million. By 2022, the country’s COE auction set a new record, with coffee beans selling for an astonishing $400.5 per pound (approximately 2,899 RMB), demonstrating the international market’s high recognition of Ethiopia’s specialty coffee.
However, in 2023, due to domestic political unrest and intense clashes between the left-wing party Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) and the new government, the situation deteriorated. After evaluation, the organizing non-profit organization ACE (Alliance for Coffee Excellence) and the Ethiopian Coffee and Tea Authority decided to suspend that year’s COE event. It wasn’t until 2024, when the government announced that the domestic situation had stabilized, that this international coffee event could be restarted.
This year’s COE competition received 500 entries, and ultimately 27 coffees stood out with scores above 87. Notably, these winning coffees not only all used the sun-dried processing method but were also consistently from the JARC-developed numbered varieties, showcasing the rising trend of these varieties in the international specialty coffee market.
In fact, in the 2021 Ethiopia COE competition, numbered varieties had already begun to appear in large numbers, though a few heirloom or Typica varieties could still be seen. But by 2022 and 2024, the list of winners was entirely dominated by these systematically cultivated and selected numbered varieties.
Ethiopia is home to approximately 10,000 to 15,000 coffee varieties, the vast majority of which have not yet undergone complete genetic identification, and are therefore often collectively referred to as “Heirloom” heirloom varieties. However, with the growing demand in the specialty coffee market for unique flavors and rare varieties, local efforts to refine and name varieties have gradually accelerated, with JARC numbered varieties being one of the representatives.
JARC (Jimma Agricultural Research Center) is the Jimma Agricultural Research Center. Between 1973 and 1975, the institution collected 639 coffee varieties from 15 regions in Ethiopia for planting trials and characteristic evaluations. Ultimately, 13 of these varieties performed exceptionally well, not only demonstrating good disease resistance, drought tolerance, and high yield potential, but also receiving praise for their flavor profiles.
For easier management and identification, JARC assigned these 13 varieties the name “1974/1975 CBD-Resistent Selections” and gave them numerical codes, such as the commonly seen 74110, 74158, etc. The first two digits of the code represent the year of collection or trial, while the following digits are the variety serial number. This numbering system remains an important reference in the industry for identifying these varieties to this day.
In this year’s COE competition, most of the winning coffees came from the Sidama region, with the Bensa and Bona sub-regions standing out the most. Bona is located in the eastern part of the Sidama zone, while Bensa lies to its east. The two areas are geographically close but each has its own distinct characteristics.
The Bona region is influenced by the East African Rift, resulting in generally high altitudes, with coffee-growing areas ranging from approximately 2,150 meters to 2,330 meters above sea level, representing a typical high-altitude growing environment. In addition, the area is supplied with abundant and stable water sources from several tributaries of the Genale River, and the volcanic soils of Holo are rich in minerals, fertile, and well-drained. These natural conditions provide an excellent foundation for cultivating high-quality coffee and are also a key reason why the region has consistently achieved outstanding results in the COE competition.
The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.
