Green coffee, that is raw, can be quality or poor, based on its organoleptic properties, therefore the pleasant taste, but also and above all for the quantity of defects present.

The term “quality” is too often used, or rather abused, without a real correlation with the coffee in question.

This term is used to describe more of a subjective aspect, that is to express whether the coffee I drank is akin to my tastes or not.

However, we should strive to distinguish subjective pleasure from objective quality.

Let me explain: a quality coffee must reflect a series of parameters and be included in internationally valid tables, established by the professional experts of the sector registered with the world coffee associations, so as to give a valid parameter to anyone, at any time and in any part of the world.

It is also normal for each of us to have our own favorite taste, but let’s remember that it is not certain that if we like it then it is necessarily of high quality.

Our tastes are personal and must remain so.

Therefore, in this article we will first understand how the classification of defects in green coffee works and then list them all.

The Classification of Green Coffee Defects

The main bodies that regulate the marketing of coffee are:

1. ICO (International Coffee Organization) – which regulates relations between producers and consumers;
2. ECC (European Contract for Coffee) – which defines the commercial rules for the sale within the European territories, such as the maximum humidity allowed in the beans, the maximum weight loss, the tare weight of the bags, the rules of boarding, arbitrage, etc.;
3. New York & Sugar Exchange – the exchange for the marketing of Arabica coffees;
4. London – the Robusta coffee marketplace.

As you can see, the quality of green coffee is not a marketing parameter!

What does it mean? A non quality coffee, although full of defects and with an unpleasant taste, can still be sold.

This is why not all the coffees on the market are quality coffees, quite the opposite.

However, there is a defect assessment table, namely the New York one, which indicates what these defects are and their severity.

In this way we can categorize commercial coffee and give it a value from 2 to 8 to understand its actual quality (NY2, NY3, NY4, …).

And remember: the classification of defects is not used to understand if you can sell coffee or not, but to understand its price: a bag with many defects will have a MUCH lower price than one without defects.