goodmorningpapua.com – One of the sought-after commodities in large during the 2021 National Sports Week or PON XX Papua is coffee. Coffee can be directly enjoyed by athletes, officials, and PON tourists, it can also be made use as souvenirs.
A researcher from the Papua Archaeological Center, Hari Suroto, said that one of the Papuan coffees largely sought after by specialty coffee lovers is Kiwirok coffee. “Papua is indeed the best Arabica coffee producing area,” said Hari Suroto. People generally cultivate Arabica coffee in the central mountains of Papua at an altitude of 1,500 to 2,000 m above sea level or mdpl.
Kiwirok coffee is arabica coffee coming from the Kiwirok District, Bintang Mountains Regency, Papua. Hari Suroto explained that the Kiwirok area is hilly with a slope of 45 to 49 degrees. At this altitude, the air temperature is very cold around 18 to 23 degrees Celsius, foggy, and the intensity of sunlight is less.
This natural condition makes Kiwirok coffee special. Kiwirok coffee is included in the cup of excellent because it has a unique taste and is rarely found in other Arabica coffees. Kiwirok coffee has citrus, berry, fruity, sweet potatoes, sugar cane, and peach flavors.
Hari Suroto said that the variety in taste of Kiwirok coffee could be because it was planted in an intercropping way with sweet potatoes.
“That’s because the sweet sweet potato taste becomes a bit dominant,” he said. The Kiwirok community plants coffee organically. The process of harvesting and processing coffee does not use machines. All processes are manual by hand.
To get to Kiwirok District, the public and tourists must take a small twin otter plane. Kiwirok airport has a runway length of 600 x 18 meters, with flights once a week. Flights using small planes, only once a week, are also often stopped due to security problems. This condition has an impact on the despatch of coffee from the Ngalum Tribe farmers in the Kiwirok District to Sentani, Jayapura.