Caracterização físico-química de café arábica produzidos no CCA – UFPB.

Abstract

Brazil, with its diverse climates and reliefs, stands out for its wide variety of coffee production. In the municipality of Areia, in Paraíba, coffee growing has been reintegrated thanks to favorable climatic and geographic conditions. Moisture from the coast meets the Alagoa Grande mountain range, increasing the incidence of rainfall in the region compared to other mountain ranges in the West. In addition, the humic Latosol is rich in organic matter, similar to that found in large coffee-producing regions, such as São Paulo and Minas Gerais. In this context, this study aimed to characterize the physical-chemical parameters of five samples of coffee of the Coffea arabica species, namely: N3G, N4N and N5T, produced by UFPB (Campus II), and compare them with two commercial samples (A1UT and S2BT). All analyses were performed in triplicate. The relationship between residue quantifications in optical analysis was determined by a 1% confidence interval. Parameters such as pH, titratable acidity, moisture, ash content, optical microscopy, water activity, colorimetry, total phenolic compounds and compressibility index were statistically analyzed by analysis of variance. Significant

differences between different coffee samples were determined using the 5% Tukey test for post- hoc comparisons. The results demonstrated that the coffee from UFPB presented

physicochemical characteristics compatible with quality standards and, when compared to the commercial coffees under study, stood out especially for the quality of grain processing observed in optical microscopy. It is worth mentioning that the valorization of this regional product can boost the local economy and encourage sustainable practices in the rise of coffee growing in the Brejo region of Paraíba.