Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Don’t they ever get tired of being wrong?
Coffee may become more scarce and expensive thanks to climate change – new research
January 28, 2022 12.27am AEDT
Denis J Murphy
Professor of Biotechnology, Head of Genomics & Computational Biology Research, University of South WalesThe world could lose half of its best coffee-growing land under a moderate climate change scenario. Brazil, which is the currently world’s largest coffee producer, will see its most suitable coffee-growing land decline by 79%.
That’s one key finding of a new study by scientists in Switzerland, who assessed the potential impacts of climate change on coffee, cashews and avocados. All three are important globally traded crops that are mainly produced by small-scale farmers in the tropics.
Coffee is by far the most important with an expected revenue of US$460 billion (£344 billion) in 2022, while the figures for avocado and cashew are respectively $13 billion and $6 billion. While coffee mainly serves as a stimulatory beverage, avocados and cashews are widely consumed food crops that are rich in monounsaturated plant oils and other beneficial nutrients
…
Read more: https://theconversation.com/coffee-may-become-more-scarce-and-expensive-thanks-to-climate-change-new-research-175766
The abstract of the study;
Expected global suitability of coffee, cashew and avocado due to climate change
Roman Grüter, Tim Trachsel, Patrick Laube, Isabel Jaisli
Published: January 26, 2022
Coffee, cashew and avocado are of high socio-economic importance in many tropical smallholder farming systems around the globe. As plantation crops with a long lifespan, their cultivation requires long-term planning. The evaluation of climate change impacts on their biophysical suitability is therefore essential for developing adaptation measures and selecting appropriate varieties or crops. In this study, we modelled the current and future suitability of coffee arabica, cashew and avocado on a global scale based on climatic and soil requirements of the three crops. We used climate outputs of 14 global circulation models based on three emission scenarios to model the future (2050) climate change impacts on the crops both globally and in the main producing countries. For all three crops, climatic factors, mainly long dry seasons, mean temperatures (high and low), low minimum temperatures and annual precipitation (high and low), were more restrictive for the global extent of suitable growing regions than land and soil parameters, which were primarily low soil pH, unfavourable soil texture and steep slopes. We found shifts in suitable growing regions due to climate change with both regions of future expansion and contraction for all crops investigated. Coffee proved to be most vulnerable, with negative climate impacts dominating in all main producing regions. For both cashew and avocado, areas suitable for cultivation are expected to expand globally while in most main producing countries, the areas of highest suitability may decrease. The study reveals that climate change adaptation will be necessary in most major producing regions of all three crops. At high latitudes and high altitudes, however, they may all profit from increasing minimum temperatures. The study presents the first global assessment of climate change impacts on cashew and avocado suitability.
Read more: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0261976
The claim that ranges for growing Avocados, Coffee and Cashews are limited in any meaningful sense is a myth.
For starters, there are plenty of Southern Andean highlands which are currently way too cold for such crops. Global warming would fix that.
In my native Queensland, Avocado trees pretty much grow wherever you drop a seed, over a vast area of land and a large range of climatic conditions.
I’m not so familiar with Cashews, but I’m willing to bet they’re pretty tolerant to a broad range of conditions as well.
As for coffee, in Australia we grow delicious lowland coffee. Australia doesn’t have high alpine regions on the scale of South America, East Africa or Indonesia, so we had to develop strains of coffee which can still produce a delicious beverage when grown at relatively low altitudes. Guess what, after decades of effort, we succeeded.
No remotely plausible amount of global warming would have any noticeable impact on the availability of global staple crops, other than possibly a small shift in growing range.
Most of the news reports I have seen over the years of climate issues and coffee are due to cold, not excessive heat. I do seem to recall a major crop loss in Brazil last year due to cold.
Meanwhile Canadians arriving in Ottawa to cheer on Turd Ferguson…I mean Justin Trudeau 😉
Climate Catastrophe Causes Colombian Coffee Calamity
Beans Brought By Borneo Brew Better
Guatemala Grinds Grow Great
Ah, but Trudeau will have no truck with them!
Despite the frost last July and August, 2022 Brazilian coffee production is estimated to increase 16.8% over 2021.
These “studies” are nothing more than click bait propaganda for the religious Alarmist™ world view.
I have eaten avocados grown in the northern Mexican state of Chihuaha and southern California. In the US Gulf of Mexico they are cold limited like mangroves that recently took a serious dive.
From the methods section of the paper I think they did not account for the additional co2 in the atmosphere. I guess that might have been:1. Too, easy to actually quantify a benefit from existing data, and 2. Too beneficial.
I seem to recall that additional co2 can help with adaptation to heat and cold stress…
There you go, coffee production world wide doesnt appear to be doing too bad with the present horrific climate crisis.
Oooo sorry, if we draw the baseline in 2017 it looks like the trend is down, children won’t know what coffee is by 2050.
Models all the way down.
If there is the slightest chance of a single coffee bean being affected, I’m jumping on that bandwagon. Now! Where do I sign up as a warmistidiot?
Start with skepticalscience.com
I can do without the avocados, but coffee? If that goes, we’re doomed!
I can do without the coffee, but avocados? If they go, we’re doomed!
Likewise and I notice avos do really well in the SW of Western Australia including Manjimup which you would hardly call tropical
No they don’t get tired of being wrong. When the great majority of your audience has the attention span of a minnow, you can keep being wrong for ever.
When you tell a myth more often, it’s still just a myth
When you repeat a lie often enough, stupid people believe you. Just ask that nice man Herman Goering.
But it is new research.
And worse than we thought
They undertake a fair amount of butt-covering by putting as many caveats as possible, mainly using “the study suggests” & all the other vague, wishy-washy, excuses as to why their prediction didn’t come true!!! John Brignal on his website defined an economist, as someone with a ready excuse as to why his prediction failed, just the same for climate scientists, just keep the cheques rolling in boys, the pension-pot is growing nicely!!!
I wouldn’t mind giving Aussie coffee a try. I don’t think I’ve seen it in my neck of the woods in the U.S.
There are some coffee shops that specialize in exotic beans. I suppose if I hit up enough of those shops, I’ll eventually stumble across one that has some OZ coffee to try.
Also have a look for New Guinea Gold, from the highlands of PNG. When we were visiting up in the highlands, it was customary to take a few jars of the instant version, as the growers rarely got a chance to savour their own crop. “Coffee Brothers” also have supplies from Tanna in Vanuatu.
Thanks for the tips, Martin.
Hopefully, I’ll stumble across a shop that has a lot of coffees from that region as well.
But Aussie coffee is #1 on my list to chase down. The article made it sound pretty darn tasty.
You’re in luck. A quick Duckduckgo search turned up quite a few sources. Here’s one.
https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/ip3/coffeebeansshop.com.au.icohttps://coffeebeansshop.com.au › buy-coffee-beans
About Coffee Beans Shop You have without a doubt come to the number one retailer to purchase the best coffee beans Australia-wide! If you are passionate about supporting Australian local business and prefer a better coffee bean offering than you’d find with Coles or Woolworth’s coffee beans, we’ve got you covered.
Check out Banz Kofi – they deliver worldwide via DHL 🙂
https://www.banzkofi.com/collections/all
Since I found many sources on-line, I have to thank you for the idea. My husband’s birthday is in April. I’m going to buy him some Australian beans. He loves coffee as do I. Maybe he’ll let me drink some of it. He makes great coffee and is the coffee maker in our house.
You should give Indian coffee a go also. That can be very good. When all the other regions collapse due to climate change, perhaps they can take up the slack.
If you are a climatista,
better check your numbers, mista!
Coffee tolerates heat more than the chill.
They got a zillion tons of coffee in Brazil!
(Apologies to Bob Hilliard and Dick Miles)
It’s always been about controlling the narrative, not reporting the reality.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but was it not from 1984 or was it Lenin, who created the phrase, “He who controls the past controls the present, he who controls the present controls the future!!!” As you say it’s ALL about controlling the narrative!!!
Let’s have a look at how global warming has affected Brazil’s coffee production so far:
?w=866&ssl=1
Production rose pretty sharply from 1990 to 2010 – up about 170% over 20 years.
As Eric Worrall said: Don’t they ever get tired of being wrong?
I suspect the increased CO2 had a hand in the increased production, not that we’re supposed to mention that.
Might those 10 year spans being charted reflect planting areas being expanded and trees subsequently coming into increased productivity rather than correlations with “warming”? Columbia apparently did not follow the same trend.
I don’t believe that Colombian productions has dropped…
Columbians can plant other crops that pay better , bit like Afghanistan .
Mission oriented damage control
studies are an interesting facet of the climateering enterprise. A year ago, the main coffee growing area in Brazil was devastated by frost from a mass of cold air from Antarctica, where an overall cooling trend has been recorded since satellite measurements started in 1979. This was another huge blow to “crisis” AGW that flustered even the most brazen Global Warming spin doctors.
This study, of course, makes no mention whatsoever of last year’s embarrassing coffee crop wipeout, which is a huge ‘tell’. They tipped their hand further, however, mentioning temperature change with “high and low” in brackets and they mention Brazil’s future problems for their coffee business.
In, a few years, if this problem repeats, the useful fools will point out that it was predicted by this study!
The additional tell is an oldy. They add cashews and avocados to try to distract the reader further away from the ‘mission’ target. In the patent medicine business, if someone discovers a potent natural cure, body slimming agent or wrinkle remover that’s abundant in a readily available berry or plant, they always blend it with two more exotic ingredients to ‘optimize’ the effect so it is a tecky product you have to buy from one source at an elevated price. The same trick is pulled with clothes washing machines (various settings) to make them more sophisticated. Most users users use one mode of the machine.
‘Tells’ are IQ tests for both teller and listener.
Do be careful using that ghastly word “sophisticated”, it don’t mean what peeps think it means!!!
Avocados are grown in NZ too, and plenty of them.
and NZ at the low temperature threshold so another degree C and less frost is welcome.
Regarding 10 year growing trends regions change varieties are developed CO2 helps all.
Gotta love 21st century humans. Smart enough to contemplate creating a civilisation on Mars …. But too dumb to move a coffee plantation two hours up the road.
So, “dumb as a box of rocks” on all counts by your reckoning I guess.
Certainly Mars will never be a suitable or profitable venue for human habitation. No doubt there will be a few trips to say “been there done that”. Then fifty years until a new group of impractical dreamers and military-industrial complex government funding parasites need to repeat the stupid pet tricks of their grandparents.
Can’t the climate alarmists find anything that supports their fear mongering desires?
So far they have advanced.
This is not an exhaustive list just what comes immediately to mind feel free to add your own favourite false scare.
You missed off one,
21. Levels of bullshite will increase rapidly in years to come in step with increased levels of CO2!!! Fact!!!
Awesome rant!
If man made climate change is settled science, then the term “It’s worse than we thought” would never be uttered by any climate scientist.
They can’t have it both ways. Their own duplicity exposes the BS for what it is.
When I lived in Rabaul, New Britain in New Guinea I had a huge brilliant Avocado tree beside the house producing like crazy.
Now I live in South East Queensland, & the adjacent Tamborine mountain is a large avocado producer, & we have a producing tree on the plane at near sea level. Pretty happy to grow anywhere, provided they get enough water with good drainage.
Coffee grows very happily beside the avocados on Tamborine mountain
The “small shift” in growing range like means it will be larger
Just think how horribly this will affect the Canadian prairie. It’s a catastrophe!
Hmmm, interesting, as I sit here, 5am, in my apartment, in Meta, Colombia, sipping my delicious hot Colombian coffee…better make another cup quickly before the Klimate Krisis hits….
Wikipedia:
While a 2011 New York Times article claimed that regional climate change associated with global warming had caused Colombian coffee production to decline from 12 million 132-pound bags, the standard measure, to 9 million bags between 2006 – 2010, with average temperatures rising 1 degree Celsius between 1980 and 2010, and average precipitation increasing 25 percent in the preceding years, disrupting the specific climatic requirements of the Coffea arabica bean,[14] yields of Colombia coffee increased significantly from 2011 to 2018 to 14.2 million bags.
(true? dunno, have to do more research after another cup)
OMG! OMG! What will the (il)liberal elite do for breakfast now!
Dirty water and tofu toast.
It is not the climate that kills, it is the government policies.
Limited water? Save some obscure non-human species and let humans die from starvation since they can’t farm.
Yet another claim to alarm people about climate change, based on computer models.
“The biggest problem with computer models is getting them to match-up with reality.”
Look, I think there has been a modest amount of warming in the last 40 years related to human caused increases in CO2, and most of it has been beneficial.
But the second there is any serious threat to my coffee supply there are going to be politicians hanging on lampposts until it’s fixed.
This one from November 2012
The Impact of Climate Change on Indigenous Arabica Coffee (Coffea arabica): Predicting Future Trends and Identifying Priorities (plos.org)
Somebody is getting a lot of research money to run climate models and issue reports.
What that has to do with actually observing yield results is beyond me.
this repetitive fear mongering isn’t any different than when some Quack with an
agenda does some half baked study on all the ‘evils’ of drinking coffee every couple years. It’s all hogwash. The only reason to read the tripe is to see how the blowhards
have changed the presentation this time, what new words they have invented, what weasel words they use & what new fears they are trying to foist on the public.
As for myself, sometime when I was around 7 or 8 yo I had my first drink & never
looked back. I’m now 76 yo & coffee hasn’t harmed me in any way. Funny thing is
my mom who was a chronic nag never got on me about it. She liked her coffee too.
She sure did raise the roof about smoking but that’s a story for another time.
Avocado and Coffee is an unusual combination I’ve never considered before. Not sure how to implement it yet, but it sounds good. Thanks for the idea.
There’s a glut of avocados in Australia at the moment. Cheap as chips!