What's the Story Behind These Coded Coffee Varieties? Is SL34 Typica or Bourbon? What Are 74110, 158?

The Mystery Behind Coffee Variety Codes

Friends who regularly drink pour-over coffee likely pay attention to the coffee varieties they encounter. Beyond origin and processing methods, the bean variety itself is a crucial factor in determining flavor profiles.

However, in the variety information section, you'll occasionally encounter variety names that resemble mysterious codes. Unlike conventional varieties such as Typica or Geisha, which have well-known names, these are represented by numbers or alphanumeric "codes." This naturally makes one wonder: what significance do these codes hold? Let FrontStreet Coffee share the insights!

74/75 Series: 74158, 74110, etc.

Long numbers like 74110, 74112, and 74158 are frequent fixtures on Ethiopia's Cup of Excellence (COE) rankings. That's right—they're also variety names!

In 1970, coffee anthracnose devastated Ethiopia. This disease causes coffee fruits on coffee trees to develop lesions and then necrotize. Generally, coffee trees affected by this disease experience yield reductions of at least 20%, reaching terrifying levels of 70-80% in severe cases! This shows the immeasurable losses this disease caused to Ethiopia's coffee economy at the time. Harar and Yirgacheffe were the most severely affected Ethiopian origins.

Spraying pesticides couldn't completely eradicate the spread of this disease, so the Jimma Agricultural Research Center (JARC) decided to address it from the source. They aimed to identify varieties with high disease-resistant genes, which could directly immunize against the disease's harmful effects. Numbers like 74110 and 74158 represent disease-resistant varieties later released by JARC. The first two digits "74" represent the discovery year, while the last three digits "110/158" represent the experimental sample numbers for that year. For example, "74110" would be the 110th variety from 1974.

F1 and H1 Varieties

F1 and H1 are two coffee varieties that have gained significant popularity in American growing regions in recent years, and their development is also related to coffee diseases. Also in 1970, coffee cultivation in the Americas was similarly affected by diseases. Since most coffee grown at that time was Arabica, leaf rust spread relentlessly, leaving no cultivation unaffected. The American coffee industry suffered a severe blow as a result.

To revitalize the coffee industry and reduce potential losses from future disease outbreaks, the French Agricultural Research Center for International Development (CIRAD) and the Central American Coffee Organization (ROMECAFE) jointly launched a new coffee variety breeding program, attempting to develop coffee varieties with extremely strong disease resistance. This project was named F1, and the coffee varieties developed through this project are F1 varieties. (The Bahia variety is an F1).

H1, meanwhile, was developed after the F1 series was created, as laboratory research continued. H1's full name is Centroamericano H1, and it's a hybrid of Rume Sudan and Sarchimor T-5296.

SL Series (SL28, SL34, etc.)

The SL series is likely very familiar to everyone. SL28 and SL34 from this series can be described as Kenya's "star" varieties. Whenever discussing them, FrontStreet Coffee associates them with the bright tomato-like acidity of Kenyan coffee, bringing tears to the corners of our mouths.

In 1930, the Kenyan government commissioned Scott Laboratories to conduct coffee breeding research to find coffee varieties suitable for Kenya's terroir and commercial cultivation. Over the following years, Scott Laboratories collected various varieties from different regions and conducted targeted research. Eventually, several varieties stood out, and these selected beans were all prefixed with "SL" - the abbreviation for Scott Laboratories - with subsequent numbers representing their respective codes.

SL28 and SL34 are the standouts in this series. Genetic testing revealed that SL28 is a Bourbon variety mutation, while SL34 is a Typica variety mutation. Both varieties, due to their excellent flavors and strong drought and disease resistance, were immediately adopted for large-scale cultivation after Scott Laboratories released them - truly remarkable! Besides these common "numbered varieties," there are other obscure ones like K7 and ET47. FrontStreet Coffee will share more about these another time!

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