Barista Magazine

APR-MAY 2013

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Costa Rica estimate reductions in production this year anywhere from 15 to 30 percent depending on the region in which they are working. In El Salvador the outbreak is especially intense due to the prevalence of planted Bourbon varieties, which are susceptible to cofee rust. What we will see next year depends wholly on actions taken to control the fungus taken this year. If national eforts being discussed now—states of emergency have been declared in Honduras, Costa Rica, and Guatemala at the time of writing this article—do not happen or are not executed properly, we could be talking about production numbers cut in half for the afected countries. All in, that is a lot of cofee and potentially millions of lives impacted at origin. We must think about those lives afected along with protecting our supply and support short- and long-term solutions. Take Guatemala, for example. Te country's cofee association, Anacafe, reported in February press releases about the fungus that this year already around 100,000 jobs would be negatively impacted by the outbreak. It is reported that in the country, some 500,000 people work directly in cofee with another 700,000 working indirectly in sectors supporting the cofee industry: in-country transit, gasoline sales, milling operations, shipping, exportation, etc. More than half a million people in Guatemala face impending employment risks and nearcertain fnancial peril if measures are not taken to control the outbreak. Where We Go From Here So what can we do, as an industry that has historically been so connected to the origins of our product, not only to safeguard our supplies and ensure cofee remain a viable crop for people throughout efected areas? Tere are both longer and shorter-term tactics that we need to consider. First, I ofer that most certifcation programs include a required farm-management plan or something like it which leads not only to more responsible business practices in agricultural operations, but also to better husbandry. Tis will assist in early detection of disease outbreaks so that they can be treated before becoming out of control. Tese requirements should be in place in order to support a farmer's need to control problems that could drive up costs—nip things in the bud, if you will. With more than a decade of personal experience working with certifcations in the feld, I am a huge proponent of introducing these additional layers of consideration into how agricultural entities operate; in many communities where I have played a role in the introduction of certifcation I have seen frsthand how requirements facilitate understanding and responsibility in the production and processing of cofee. I believe discovering the right balance of responsibility in business is one key to feeding our needs for future generations, and the early detection of problems like cofee rust is no small part of that. Secondly, let's talk about price. Simple math can tell us that the costs of controlling these outbreaks is going to require us to pay higher prices for our cofees. We cannot expect producers to take only from their own pockets to guarantee production of the cofee we need to have our businesses. Yes, they really need the business since in many cases it is their livelihood, but let me remind all of us: We need it, too. World supply and demand equations for cofee still have us in this territory of possible oversupply, but that phenomenon is short lived. Just considering the growing middle classes of China and India and their propensity to want to drink cofee communicates the solid prediction that we are going to need more and more of this stuf. International Cofee Organization fgures, in fact, estimate that we will need around 20 million more bags of cofee produced annually by 2020 in order to meet projected consumption demands of 173.6 million bags. So while the news for the short term is still oversupply, we need to take an increasingly long-term view toward protecting our industry, and one of the most important ways of doing so is by working with the supply chain toward ascertaining the correct price for us to pay for these precious beans in order to support their production. Price must, however, be accompanied by education of and discussion with our supply chain partners. We cannot simply throw more money at producers. We need to ensure that we are having ongoing discussions with our supply partners about the challenges they face and the expectations we have that they take adequate care so that they have a farm and we have a supply. Tese conversations are happening increasingly as our industry evolves toward less anonymity in the supply chain, but we still have so much work to do to ensure the message of how critical good husbandry practices are reaches our farming partners of all kinds. And then there is World Cofee Research (WCR) as another potential solution for the future of our specialty-cofee industry that has come so far in the promotion and appreciation of high-quality cofees. Tis is an especially important one, as it endeavors to secure the future of all of our business in specialty cofee. WCR is the frst research efort with an international outlook on increasing genetic diversity in new hybrids that will help us adapt to a changing climate. "WCR is working together with national cofee institutes and is in the process of developing new prebreeding populations which will possess over 10 times the level of genetic diversity used to produce today's cofee varieties," says WCR's director, Dr. Tim Schilling. "It is expected that the increased diversity will result in new rust resistance genes with Arabica backgrounds and Production decline estimates from agronomist interviews for 2012/ 2013 Production decline estimates from agronomist interviews for 2013/ 2014 Costa Rica's Icafé estimates range from 15–25% (some areas 50%) Costa Rica estimates around 30% El Salvador's Consejo estimates range from 30–40% El Salvador estimates range from 50–60% Guatemala's Anacafé notes 30% loss When queried, most agronomists stated that if drastic control measures are not taken, coffee production areas could nearly disappear, hence the need to act now. www.baristamagazine.com 81

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