Mundo Novo
A naturally occurring hybrid of Typica and Bourbon first identified in Brazil, valued for vigour and productivity. A parent variety of Catuaí.
In short
Mundo Novo is an arabica variety that arose when Bourbon and Typica, the two founding lineages, crossed naturally in a field in the Brazilian state of São Paulo. It was identified in 1943 and became one of the mainstays of Brazilian coffee.
It is vigorous, productive and tall. Those three words explain both why Brazil took to it and why most of Central America did not.
A chance cross, carefully selected
Sourced
The World Coffee Research catalogue records that the cross was found in Mineiros do Tietê in São Paulo state, and that seed from it was planted in the municipality then called Novo Mundo, now Urupês, which gave the variety its name. It was discovered there in 1943.
Brazil's Instituto Agronômico made its first selections between 1943 and 1952 and began distributing the variety to farmers in 1952. Further selections were released from 1977.
Its mixed parentage is visible in the plant. The catalogue lists the colour of its young leaf tips as green or bronze. Bourbon's are green and Typica's are bronze, and Mundo Novo can show either, a small field sign of the cross that produced it.
What the cross produced
Sourced
| Variable | Typical range | What moving it does |
|---|---|---|
| Stature | Tall | |
| Lineage | Typica crossed with Bourbon, naturally | |
| Yield potential | Medium | |
| Quality potential at high altitude | Good | |
| Nutrition requirement | High | |
| First production | Year 3 | |
| Coffee leaf rust | Susceptible | |
| Coffee berry disease | Susceptible | |
| Nematodes | Susceptible |
As listed in the World Coffee Research catalogue, which describes it as a vigorous and productive plant with a good-quality cup.
Why it suits Brazil and not its neighbours
CoffeeHQ explanation
Much Brazilian coffee is grown on large farms on gently rolling land where harvesting is mechanised. A tall, vigorous tree is no handicap to a machine that straddles the row, and vigour means the plant recovers well from that treatment.
Central American coffee is mostly grown on steep slopes and picked by hand, where a tall tree is slower and more awkward to harvest and cannot be planted as densely. The catalogue records Mundo Novo reaching Costa Rica in 1952, Guatemala in 1963 and 1964 and Honduras in 1974, and notes that its adoption there stayed limited because of its height. Compact varieties won instead.
Its place in the family tree
Sourced
What it is like to drink
Tendency, not a guarantee
Mundo Novo is closely tied to the familiar Brazilian style: low acidity, a heavy body, and flavours usually described as nutty and chocolatey. As with other varieties, that style owes as much to where and how Brazilian coffee is grown and processed, at moderate altitude and often by the natural or pulped natural method, as to the plant.
You are more likely to meet it as a component of an espresso blend than as a named single-variety coffee, which reflects what it is valued for: reliability and body.
What to do next
- Coffee from Brazil — The country whose coffee this variety helped define.
- Pulped natural processing — The Brazilian method that shapes how much of this coffee tastes.
- Catuai — What breeders made from it next.
- Become a coffee expert — A structured programme from the plant and its processing to roasting, water and tasting.
Where Mundo Novo is documented in the atlas
Only countries CoffeeHQ has written an entry for, and only where a document it has read names Mundo Novo there. This is not a list of everywhere it is grown.
- Brazil. Found in Brazil and distributed from 1952; a research consortium estimated in 2012 that it and Catuaí together were about 85 per cent of what was planted, an estimate that is old and unsourced in the release that gives it. Source: Consórcio Pesquisa Café destaca as cultivares do IAC que mudaram a cafeicultura brasileira nos últimos 50 anos.
- Peru. The catalogue says the variety has commercial importance in Brazil and other South American countries, and names Peru. Source: Coffee Varieties Catalog: arabica and robusta entries, with the histories of each.
- Papua New Guinea. Listed among the tall arabica varieties in commercial use by a 2017 research report crediting a Coffee Industry Corporation officer; no share of the area is given. Source: Improving livelihoods of smallholder families through increased productivity of coffee-based farming systems in the highlands of PNG: final report (ASEM/2008/036, FR2017-08).
Parent varieties
Learn it as a course
The Coffee Expert lesson Species and varieties covers this ground in order, with exercises you can do at home.