organic coffee is produced without synthetic agro-chemicals and plant protection methods. a certification is essential by the accrediting agency for such coffee to market it (popular forms are of regular, decaffeinated, flavoured and instant coffee variety) as such since they are popular in europe, united states and japan. the indian terrain and climatic conditions provide the advantages required for the growth of such coffee in deep and fertile forest soils under the two tier mixed shade using cattle manure, composting and manual weeding coupled with the horticultural operations practised in its various coffee plantations; small holdings is another advantage for such a variety of coffee. in spite of all these advantages, the certified organic coffee holdings in india, as of 2008, (there are 20 accredited certification agencies in india) was only in an area of with production estimated at 1700 tonnes. in order to promote growth of such coffee, the coffee board, based on field experiments, surveys and case studies has evolved many packages for adoption, supplemented with information guidelines and technical documents.