What is the S.288 coffee varietal?

S.288 (Selection 288) is a coffee cultivar released by the Coffee Board of India in 1937. Selected from plants showing resistance to coffee leaf rust, it's derived from Arabica material with possible introgression from a related Coffea species that provides the CLR resistance.

Its place in history is as one of the earliest scientifically selected rust-resistant Arabica cultivars. It performs well on India's lower-altitude estates with good productivity and commercially acceptable cup quality.

Its lasting contribution is as a parent in S795 - India's most widely planted commercial cultivar - and in demonstrating that selecting for disease resistance in Arabica was possible. S.288 itself is now less commonly planted than its descendants, but the work it represented was foundational for everything that followed in rust-resistance breeding.