Coffee has a climate problem. Here’s how to fix it

While climate activists have been reassured that meat is mostly off the menu at the upcoming 28th U.N. Climate Change Conference, or COP 28, organizers say that coffee will be readily available at kiosks throughout the Dubai venue. Yet the viability of coffee in the face of climate change remains largely off the summit’s agenda.

Coffee production is a $127 billion industry that 12.5 million largely smallholder farmers and their families worldwide rely on for income. But rising temperatures caused by climate change put it in jeopardy. Its diminished growth could increase poverty levels.

According to research by the Inter-American Development Bank, the amount of arable land where coffee fruit is cultivated will shrink by up to 50% by 2050 as a result of higher temperatures, which will also increase the prevalence of what’s known as coffee leaf rust — a type of fungus that can destroy entire coffee plantations.