News and knowledge

If global warming continues at its current pace, growing the beans in coffee-proud Puerto Rico could be impossible in as little as 50 years, a new study says.

While Washington debates whether climate change is a hoax or an imminent threat, the world coffee industry is not waiting for the American government to take action to protect its business. Coffee crops are under siege from deforestation, abnormally high temperatures, a lack of precipitation, and disease. The global market is heading for its fourth straight year of deficit, according to estimates from Rabobank International. At the same time, global demand for the beloved beverage is expected to reach an all-time high this year, led by demand from younger American consumers. Production will need to increase at least 50 percent by the middle of this century to keep pace with the demand, says Conservation International, an environmental organization. T

With coffee’s genetic resources being lost at a rapid pace, a new strategy aims to unite the industry to preserve this precious material. As World Coffee Research Executive Director Tim Schilling puts it, “We have to step up and take control of the genetic resources that dictate the limits and open the possibilities for the future of our industry.”

At the Starbucks inside Texas A&M University’s Evans Library, students line up for their daily jolt of java. Across campus, in a rather ordinary laboratory inside the horticulture building, Fabian Echeverria is trying to prevent a worldwide coffee shortage.

World Coffee Research has released “Coffee Varieties of Mesoamerica and the Carribean,” a first-of-its-kind catalog of arabica coffee varieties designed for use by coffee farmers. The catalog is available for free in English and Spanish (“Las Variedades de Café de Mesoamérica y el Caribe”) either in a 47-page PDF version available for free download or through an interactive website. The nonprofit WCR also plans to distribute the catalog to thousands of coffee farmers through national coffee institutions, exporters, cooperatives and nurseries that supply coffee plants and seeds.