Major Coffee Growing Regions and Varieties in Yunnan: Flavor and Taste Characteristics of Starbucks Pour-Over Yunnan Coffee

Starbucks has launched its first single-origin coffee bean from China—Starbucks Yunnan Coffee Bean—which was available for a limited time during this year's Spring Festival. This coffee uses 100% high-quality Arabica coffee beans grown in Yunnan, reflecting Starbucks' profound passion for premium coffee. It represents four years of dedicated collaboration between Starbucks' Yunnan Coffee Grower Support Center and local coffee farmers, presented as a New Year gift for Chinese coffee enthusiasts this year. Today, FrontStreet Coffee would like to introduce you to the currently popular Yunnan small-bean coffee. Let's look forward to it!

As we all know, coffee trees are only suitable for growing in tropical or subtropical regions, specifically within the area between 25 degrees north and south latitude. They require an annual rainfall of 1500-2000 millimeters, and the timing of rainfall must align with the flowering cycle of coffee trees. More than 60 coffee-producing countries, including famous ones like Ethiopia, Colombia, Brazil, and Panama, are mostly located within this region.

In fact, some regions of China, such as Yunnan, Hainan, Taiwan, and Guangxi, are also located in this geographical position. Ten years ago, few people knew that China also produced coffee. Now, when discussing Yunnan coffee, people ask: Is Chinese coffee good? In this article, FrontStreet Coffee will share with you about China's largest coffee-producing region—the Yunnan coffee region.

Yunnan's Climate and Terrain

As FrontStreet Coffee mentioned at the beginning, coffee trees have very high requirements for climate, terrain, and rainfall. So what are Yunnan's climate and terrain like? Let's explore them together with FrontStreet Coffee.

According to research by FrontStreet Coffee, Yunnan is situated in a low-latitude plateau with a special geographical location and complex topography. The terrain is high in the north and low in the south, with an elevation difference of up to 6,663.6 meters between north and south. This greatly exacerbates the temperature differences caused by latitude factors throughout the province, and such temperature variations are very suitable for coffee tree cultivation. FrontStreet Coffee would like to give you a simple example: our single-origin coffees include coffee beans from over 50 producing regions, including coffee beans from Brazil and Colombia. Brazilian coffee trees are generally planted in plains, while Colombian coffee trees are typically planted near the Andes Mountains. Compared to Brazil, Colombia has higher altitude and greater temperature differences, so Colombian coffee beans have a denser texture and more complex flavor layers.

Yunnan's high temperature variation is very beneficial for the formation of Yunnan coffee flavors, which is also one of the reasons why some places within China's coffee-growing belt cannot cultivate coffee trees. Additionally, precipitation is abundant with distinct wet and dry seasons, unevenly distributed—most areas of the province receive annual precipitation of about 1100 millimeters. Looking at daily temperature changes, mornings and evenings are cooler while noon is hotter, especially during winter and spring when daily temperature differences can reach 12-20°C. FrontStreet Coffee believes that Yunnan's climate characteristics have the advantage of being suitable for the growth of various crops, but the disadvantage is that dry and rainy seasons are too concentrated and unevenly distributed across regions, easily causing disasters.

Yunnan Coffee Varieties

Yunnan's climate type is very conducive to coffee tree cultivation, making it China's largest coffee-producing region. Over 98% of China's coffee production comes from Yunnan. While Sichuan and Hainan also grow small amounts of coffee, Hainan's coffee cultivation is mainly Robusta, whereas Yunnan, Sichuan, and Taiwan primarily cultivate Arabica varieties.

Yunnan coffee carries the banner of Chinese coffee, and FrontStreet Coffee also offers Yunnan coffee beans. FrontStreet Coffee's Yunnan single-origin coffee beans can be divided into two coffee varieties: Catimor and Typica. Yunnan small-bean coffee varieties are mainly dominated by the Catimor coffee variety, so what we now call Yunnan small-bean coffee refers to Yunnan Catimor. Small-bean coffee is suitable for growing on mountainous terrain at altitudes of 800-1800 meters. If the altitude is too high, they can easily suffer from frost damage and death; if too low, the flavor quality is poor. Most small-bean coffee is planted in dry-hot valley regions around 1100 meters altitude, allowing them to grow robustly with rich and balanced coffee aroma.

After local Yunnan coffee farmers harvest these small-bean coffees, they process them. Many articles from FrontStreet Coffee have introduced relevant processing methods for coffee green beans. For example, Indonesia uses the unique wet-hulling method suitable for its local hot and rainy climate, while dry regions like Brazil use natural processing. Yunnan's climate type is hot and rainy, so locals utilize the abundant water resources to employ the washed processing method for coffee green beans.

Yunnan Coffee Processing Methods

After farmers manually harvest coffee cherries, they process the coffee green beans following this procedure: screening coffee cherries, removing pulp, fermentation, washing, drying, and hulling.

Farmers use a depulper to separate most of the pulp from the coffee beans, then guide the parchment beans to a clean water tank, soaking them in water for fermentation to completely remove residual pulp layers. Through washed processing, the coffee exhibits distinct fruit acidity and a cleaner taste.

Like the Huaguoshan coffee beans and Yunnan small-bean coffee that FrontStreet Coffee offers, both use washed processing. FrontStreet Coffee has cupped multiple Yunnan single-origin coffee beans, and based on FrontStreet Coffee's cupping results of Yunnan coffee, the taste is also excellent. For FrontStreet Coffee's Yunnan small-bean coffee, the dry aroma smells of nuts, but when tasted, it reveals more chocolate, nut, and cream flavors, with a prominent brown sugar sweetness. The overall taste is quite balanced.

It can also be seen from FrontStreet Coffee's cupping results that Yunnan region's coffee flavor is not dominated by acidity. Instead, Yunnan coffee beans have relatively balanced flavors with nut and brown sugar notes as the foundation. So what are the coffee-producing regions in Yunnan? FrontStreet Coffee will give you a brief introduction.

Major Coffee-Producing Regions in Yunnan

Yunnan's main coffee-growing areas include Lincang, Baoshan, Dehong, and Pu'er. Among these, Pu'er is an important coffee-producing region in China, with the largest planting area, highest production, and best quality, serving as an important distribution center for international coffee business. The small-bean coffee from Yunnan is most famous in Baoshan. In December 2010, Baoshan small-bean coffee received A-level certification and passed the Chinese National Standard Administration process, being recognized as a product reflecting China's national geographical indication.

Therefore, Yunnan coffee has also attracted the attention of coffee brands like Starbucks and Nestlé. Starbucks launched its first single-origin coffee bean from China, "Starbucks Yunnan Coffee Bean," available for a limited time during this year's Spring Festival. This coffee uses 100% high-quality Arabica coffee beans grown in Yunnan, reflecting Starbucks' profound passion for premium coffee. It represents four years of dedicated collaboration between Starbucks' Yunnan Coffee Grower Support Center and local coffee farmers, presented as a New Year gift for Chinese coffee enthusiasts this year. Simultaneously, it marks another milestone in Starbucks' years of deep cultivation in the Chinese market, giving back to local communities, and sincerely cooperating with China's coffee cultivation industry for mutual growth.

Future Trends of Yunnan Coffee

FrontStreet Coffee believes that the current Yunnan coffee cultivation varieties are relatively singular and predominantly low-end, mostly consisting of the Catimor variety of Arabica coffee. The Yunnan coffee industry is primarily focused on cultivation with a single model, small scale, and scattered operations. It overly depends on primary production, with insufficient extension into secondary and tertiary industries, low output value, and lacks comprehensive competitiveness. Therefore, for Yunnan coffee to develop further, FrontStreet Coffee believes that Yunnan must create premium products. Not only does it need good coffee, but it also requires government support and business incubation, industry standards, and brand building—all indispensable elements.

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