Coffee is one of the world’s favourite drinks, however the farmers who grow coffee are confronted with big problems because of climate change. As temperatures rise, the weather becomes more and more unpredictable. More droughts and floods make it harder for coffee farmers to grow healthy plants and earn a steady income.
Coffee plants need the right temperature and amount of rain to grow. Even a small rise in temperature can make coffee beans grow less or taste worse. In countries like Brazil, Colombia, and Ethiopia, farmers have witnessed that coffee fields are not as fertile as they used to be because of hotter weather and irregular rainfall.
Climate change is also making it easier for harmful pests and plant diseases to spread. Especially small farms do not have the money to buy chemicals needed to fight off such diseases.
Another issue is the lack of water. Droughts are happening more often in many coffee-growing areas, so farmers must irrigate their fields. When it finally does rain, it can be too heavy, which washes away fertile soil and hurts young coffee plants.
As a result, coffee farmers produce less coffee, leading to higher consumer prices.
Coffee farmer in Columbia
Image: Maria del Pilar Ruiz, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Words
- confront = face
- consumer prices = what people pay for a product in a store
- disease = here: a plant illness
- drought = long period of dry weather where there is not enough water for plants and animals to live
- especially = above all
- fertile = good farming land
- fight off = here: get rid of
- flood = when water covers an area of land
- harmful = dangerous
- irregular = at different times
- irrigate = to bring water to fields with pipes and small canals
- issue = problem
- lack = not enough
- pest = a small insect or animal that destroys crops
- rise = go up
- soil = the top layer of earth, where plants grow
- spread = to move from one place to another
- steady income = to always get the same amount of money every month
- unpredictable = here: you cannot tell how something will change
- witness = see, experience