Robusta Coffee Beans are grown at temperatures between at 24-30°C and receive between 1500-3000mm (60-120in) of rainfall per year. Heavy rain is needed in the beginning of the season when the fruit is developing, and less later in the season as it ripens. Robusta Beans consist of 1.7-4% caffeine.
The harvesting period can be anywhere from three weeks to three months. When the fruit is ripe, it is almost always handpicked, using either selective picking, where only the ripe fruit is removed or strip-picking, where all of the fruit is removed from a branch all at once. Because a tree can have both ripe and unripe berries at the same time, one area of crop has to be picked several times, making harvesting the most labor intensive process of coffee bean production.
The methods of processing the coffee berries in Cote d'Ivoire is wet processing, the flesh of the berries is separated from the seeds and then the beans are fermented soaked in water for about two days. This dissolves any pulp or sticky residue that may still be attached to the beans. The beans are then washed and dried in the sun, usually on cement or brick for 2-3 weeks.
