Green Group discussion

Coffee is the world's largest 'soft' commodity. Cocoa or chocolate is the second largest.
Coffee growing may be under threat as climate change brings heat and drought up the mountainsides. This occupation provides an alternative to city living with gang issues, as shown in Kenco's Coffee V Gangs ads.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gkyxp...

A crop of coffee is also a viable alternative crop to cocaine in Central and South America.
The Irish Times followed coffee growing in Honduras in this article series sponsored by Kenco.
https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-s...

Here is a list of ways to make your coffee a healthier cup for you.
https://www.care2.com/greenliving/6-w...

Tell us what you think about coffee!

Relevant book:
Death of a Songbird


Organic coffee growing provides shade trees for migrating birds in the Americas, as this mystery demonstrates.

I only buy Audubon organic shade-grown coffee. Here is a link. It not only helps birds but the farmers as well:

https://www.audubon.org/shade-grown-c...

Thank you! Here, I notice our local supermarket own brands and most coffee shops sell either Fairtrade or Rainforest Alliance coffee.

Even when we think coffee is well certified, someone has to go and check. Some farms in Brazil were found to operate with slave-labour like conditions.
https://www.ecowatch.com/brazil-dirty...

Women coffee drinkers have been found to have lower body and abdominal fat than those who drink very little coffee. This was consistent even if the coffee was decaffeinated, according to a report in The Journal of Nutrition. The effect was also found in men but less markedly.

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-0...

Atmospheric nitrous oxide (N2O) accounts for approximately 5% of the global greenhouse effect and destroys stratospheric ozone. I am struggling to understand the science right now, but it appears that coffee plant growing is a leading cause.

Here is an article from Fortune magazine about Starbucks in general:

https://fortune.com/2020/01/21/starbu...

A technical tale about the coffee plant and caffeine gene.

https://phys.org/news/2014-09-coffee-...

Drinking two to four cups per day helps markedly protect against liver cancer. What these new stats do not tell us is whether that is because people drinking all that coffee drink less alcohol, or less sugary drinks, or whether sweeteners, milk etc. are involved.

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-0...

During the coronavirus one of the earliest effects I noticed was that coffee shops stopped taking refillable cups, to protect the staff.
Now all the ones I have visited either give pottery cups for the table, or compostable takeaway cups. The lids are still plastic.

Infographic on the process of growing, supplying and selling coffee.
Great way to visualise economics.

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/the-...

Here's the second largest soft commodity - cocoa. Not mentioned, cocoa butter is 95% used in cosmetics.

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/coco...

"Cocoa beans go through a number of stages before being used in chocolate products.

Harvesting, Fermenting, and Drying
First, farmers harvest cocoa beans from pods on cacao plants. Next, they are fermented in heaps and covered with banana leaves. Farmers then dry and package the cocoa beans for domestic transportation.
Domestic Transportation, Cleaning, and Exporting
Domestic transporters carry packaged cocoa beans to either cleaning warehouses or processing factories. Cocoa beans are cleaned and prepared for exports to the chocolate production hubs of the world.
Processing and Chocolate Production
Processing companies winnow, roast, and grind cocoa beans and then convert them into cocoa liquor, cocoa butter, or cocoa cakes—which are mixed with other ingredients like sugar and milk to produce chocolate products.
Cocoa farming and trade are at the roots of the chocolate industry, and the consistent supply of cocoa plays a critical role in providing us with reasonably-priced chocolate."

But this says cocoa farmers often earn a dollar a day.

Coffee businesses in Ireland from importers of fairtrade coffee to microbusinesses selling online to households. The lockdowns have changed our patterns of use and the firms had adapted.

https://www.rte.ie/news/boost-my-busi...

Coffee in Brazil. Thanks to WWF for this one.
"“I heard from my grandparents that it used to rain a lot in January, and the dry and rainy seasons were more clearly defined,” Fontana says. “And now, for a few years, we have noticed irregularity in rainfall, high temperature peaks, hail.”

Fontana’s home in the state of São Paulo is part of the Atlantic Forest ecoregion, an area that has been ravaged by centuries of deforestation. In 2014, the region experienced its worst drought in nearly a century, leading to an unprecedented water crisis. More than 140 cities in Brazil had to ration water; coffee plantations lost up to a third of their crops. And February 2020 was the rainiest month in the region’s recorded history, resulting in catastrophic floods. When your livelihood depends on the predictability of the seasons, it’s a scary reality.

But Fontana has fared better than many, thanks in part to her hilltop location and a significant area of natural forest that she and her family have maintained on their land.

“We are in a microregion with a lot of preserved forest, and we have a lot of water,” she says. “This microclimate helps a lot in the balance of crops.”"

https://www.worldwildlife.org/stories...

Spreading coffee pulp contributes to replenish the soil.

https://www.ecowatch.com/coffee-pulp-...

Plenty of good info about coffee crops, also price fluctuations.

"Brazil suffered a historic drought earlier this year.

That was followed by damaging frosts this week at key plantations in Minas Gerais—a southeastern inland state that produces 70 percent of the nation's arabica beans.

Sub-zero temperatures have "sparked defoliation of crops and even kill the youngest plants" that are crucial for future harvests, Mera said.

Arabica has also been heavily impacted because the crop has a biennial plant cycle, whereby low-yield production one year is followed by bumper output the following year.

'Long price crisis'

The market rallied "on freezing temperatures in Brazil growing areas last night", added Price Futures Group analyst Jack Scoville on Friday.

"Freezing temperatures were reported in much of Minas Gerais and Parana and also in Sao Paulo.

"It is not yet known how extensive the damage was but... a significant part of the crop got hurt.

"It is flowering time for the next crop and the flowers were frozen and will drop off the trees," he added, noting, however, that the weather was now turning warmer.

At the same time, world coffee demand is picking up this year as global economies reopen from the deadly coronavirus turmoil.

That has stimulated demand for arabica which tends to be used in coffee shops and restaurants, unlike the lower grade robusta favoured for making instant coffee granules.

While conditions are ripe for high prices, commodity economist Philippe Chalmin explained that the cost of coffee has been particularly low in recent years, pointing out that a pound of arabica cost more than $3 in May 2011.

"Coffee producers have experienced a very long price crisis," Valeria Rodriguez, Head of Advocacy & Public Engagement at the fair trade association Max Havelaar, told AFP.

"In the last four or five years, most of them have been working at a loss," she told AFP.

"If the crop is smaller, it means that there are coffee producers somewhere in Brazil who will have no coffee to sell, and therefore no income," she warned."

https://phys.org/news/2021-07-coffee-...

Price is rising again - still due to the pandemic, but now also to to rising price of oil. While coffee is not bought from Ukraine or Russia, the war is pushing up the price of diesel and the heavy refinery sludge used for shipping.

https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2022...

"But other factors beyond shipping are hitting coffee prices, too.

Higher energy prices mean it costs more to roast beans and transport the finished product to shops, for example.

And the price of coffee itself is going up too.

The US Coffee C Futures is a commodity market that tracks the price of specialty coffee, and it’s used as a benchmark when pricing orders.

It’s up about 50% in the past year – and it’s more than doubled in the past two years – in part because of weather warnings coming out of Brazil that traders had feared would impact the harvest."

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/cp/g...

"Close to 84% of the world’s coffee bean exports come from just 10 countries.

All these countries are found in the “Bean Belt” between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn where coffee grows best. These top coffee-producing nations include Brazil, Vietnam, and Colombia.

Here are the top coffee exporting nations in 2019:"

Link shows dataviz.

https://phys.org/news/2025-08-liberic...

"In order to protect the livelihood of coffee farmers and to keep coffee from becoming a rare (and much more expensive) delicacy, new avenues of coffee production must be explored. One such avenue is finding alternative coffee species that fare better in warmer temperatures, drought or erratic weather conditions.

A new genetic study on the coffee species liberica (Coffea liberica), published in Nature Plants, has found that liberica is actually three distinct species with unique genetic, morphological, and climate adaptations that might offer more climate-resilient alternatives to arabica and robusta coffee."

More information: A. P. Davis et al, Genomic data define species delimitation in Liberica coffee with implications for crop development and conservation, Nature Plants (2025).
https://www.nature.com/articles/s4147...
Journal information: Nature Plants

https://www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2025/12...

"Why is caffeine such a problem?
Wastewater treatment plants vary in their ability and capacity to treat and remove caffeine – ranging from 60-100% depending on treatment types, plant design, season, temperature and other elements. This means even treated water can contain caffeine when it is returned to rivers and seas.

Heavy rains add to the problem if the capacity of sewage pipes is exceeded. When this happens, untreated wastewater is designed to divert directly into rivers and water courses to prevent sewage flooding of homes, businesses and treatment plants.

Whether from a street drain or toilets, some of the caffeine that we have consumed will eventually make its way into our rivers and aquatic environments. This is a problem in every part of the world, including in Antarctica. One study of 258 rivers in 104 countries found caffeine in over 50% of sites sampled.
...
"What should and shouldn't you put in a drain?
Street drains are part of our water system. Don't put anything into a drain that you don't want to see ending up in a river, lake, on a beach or in the sea.

This means no coffee or coffee grounds, food-based liquids, oils, paint or hot fats, detergents, bleaches, liquids from building work and so on. All these should be disposed of via the appropriate household bins or waste collection centres. Leave the street drains to do their single, simple job: collecting rainwater not wastewater. What's good for your street drain is also good for your kitchen sink and good for the environment. If nothing else, be pragmatic: coffee grounds can easily block your kitchen sink.

So, what should you do with your coffee?
If you are constantly throwing away coffee water, perhaps try making less coffee. At home, you can dilute coffee water for use as a plant tonic. Coffee liquid and grounds can also be disposed of on gardens or any plant beds in small amounts with care."

https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/2...

"Researchers from Mass General Brigham tracked more than 130,000 people for over four decades and found that those who regularly consumed moderate amounts of caffeinated coffee or tea had an 18 percent lower risk of developing dementia compared to those who rarely touched the stuff.

Caffeine swiggers also scored better on some cognitive tests and were less likely to complain about memory slips, according to the study.

Before anyone starts mainlining espresso shots in the name of science, the apparent benefits weren't tied to heroic levels of caffeine intake, just to steady, mid-range consumption – roughly two to three cups a day – suggesting that consistency matters more than turning yourself into a walking coffee bean.

The data comes from the long-running Nurses' Health Study and Health Professionals Follow-Up Study, which repeatedly tracked participants' diets, cognitive performance, and dementia diagnoses over time. Of the cohort, 11,033 people developed dementia, giving researchers a sizeable dataset to work with rather than the usual small-scale snapshot studies.

Participants who stuck to that middle lane appeared to maintain memory and thinking skills more effectively as they aged, with a lower risk of cognitive decline compared to their less-caffeinated peers."

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...