“The Best Practices of Sustainable Coffee Farming that Proves How the Industry is Dedicated to Protecting the Environment”
Sustainable coffee farming has become a buzzword in the coffee industry due to its long-term environmental impact and economic impact. With new-age farming methods, the industry addresses major issues such as reduced biodiversity and farmers living in poverty.
Coffee is more than just a drink; it is a billion-dollar industry.
Coffee is one of the oldest and most heavily traded cash crops employing more than 125 million people worldwide. Approximately 12.5 million farms, of which 80 percent are small farmers from developing countries, make income critical to families and governments worldwide. It is estimated that world coffee production is approximately 155 million 60-kilogram bags, with numbers rising regularly.
For this very reason, sustainable coffee farming is now a multibillion-dollar industry. Following the best sustainable coffee farming practices help in increasing farmers’ chances of selling their products, getting higher profits, and improving their living standards.
Let’s delve into sustainable coffee farming.
How Does Sustainability Relate To Coffee?
Sustainability is not a new concept in the coffee world. Climate change and fair coffee prices have been the most discussed topics since the first international coffee agreement in 1962. Even then, there is a huge push to adopt sustainable farming methods and limit the excess amount of coffee to ensure economic sustainability.
Sustainable coffee farming is getting overwhelming support as it links people, the planet, and profit. Nowadays, while choosing good coffee beans, more focus is given to how coffee beans are being grown than knowing their origin. With sustainable coffee farming, farmers ensure that premium quality coffee is produced for commercial and home use.
With sustainable coffee farming becoming the need of the hour, new research and policies are made to offer better opportunities to farmers. Currently, all efforts are being made to eliminate intermediaries within the system for farmers to get higher profits and improve their living standards.
What are the benefits of sustainable coffee farming?
- Farmers who follow sustainable coffee farming techniques can produce premium quality coffee that international coffee organizations and traders favor.
- With less use of pesticides and fertilizers, sustainable coffee farming is proving a great initiative to save the environment.
- Even the governments are assisting farmers financially that are involved in sustainable coffee farming.
- Sustainable coffee farming is becoming a great method to produce healthier coffee beans that are better tasting.
- Better quality coffee beans from sustainable coffee farming sell at higher profits.
Best Practices of Sustainable Coffee Farming That Proves Industry’s Dedication to Protecting the Environment
With sustainable coffee farming, farmers focus on using less water and natural nutrients by spreading organic matter. The organic matter is prepared by compositing coffee pulp to reduce the dependencies on the environment.
Let’s have a look at some sustainable coffee farming methods that are inclined to protect the environment:
Use of renewable resources
Sustainable coffee farming techniques focus on minimizing population and using renewable resources for farming. By reducing the dependency on natural resources, the industry is proving its dedication to protecting the environment. With this, they are giving more to farmers and caring for the workers involved in coffee farming.
Solar Powered Equipments
When it comes to getting heating fuel for the coffee, the farmers used to cut down trees such as Eucalyptus. But now, with time, they are shifting to solar-powered heating equipment such as solar coffee dryers that emit zero pollution and are a better alternative to heat coffee beans.
Worker Friendly Initiatives
Sustainable coffee farming focuses on educating workers, providing medical care, worker education programs, and ensuring good working conditions. Worker-friendly initiatives pave the way for the coffee industry to efficiently deploy new-age farming solutions and produce premium quality coffee.
Reuse Water
Earlier in coffee farming, the water from the fermentation tanks is disposed of in lakes and rivers, a major water pollutant. As sustainable water farming is focused on minimizing water consumption, the water from fermentation tanks is filtered naturally and reused for coffee farming.
New-age Farming Methods
Coffee farmers worldwide are deploying new-age farming methods such as shade growing, biodiversification, organic farming, and sustainable coffee farming.
Sustainable Coffee Beans Are Available In A Variety Of Forms
Fair Trade Coffee
It boosts both coffee growers and retailers. TransFair is an independent certifying authority, and it guarantees coffee producers at least a minimum fair trade price. In addition, the Global Fair Trade Coffee Register assures that coffee importers purchase from small-scale producers.
Organic Coffee Beans
You may buy organic coffee beans to avoid using herbicides or pesticides in the production process. For both consumers and producers, organic coffee beans are a good choice. The sustainability of a crop depends on several factors, including the health of the soil, recycling, composting, and environmental protection. To try organic coffee beans from sustainable farming, you must buy them from BestQualityCoffee.
Bird-Friendly Coffee Beans
The coffee beans cultivated in the shade are good for songbirds. This is because they live in coffee plantations. That is why weed killers and fertilizers are less frequently needed as a result. Furthermore, shade-grown coffee favorable to migratory birds also benefits coffee growers and their customers. Because more chemicals and sugars are created in shade-grown coffee, the flavor is superior.
Why Is There an Urgent Need For Coffee Sector To Follow Sustainable Coffee Farming?
Environmental sustainability is one of the major factors that is being discussed in the agriculture sector worldwide. A huge amount of resources are required for coffee farming and have environmental impacts due to wet milling on streams creating water crises in producing countries.
The recent agriculture reports suggest that the global average water footprint of a 125 ml coffee cup is 140 liters. As the global population is expected to reach 9.8 billion by 2050, matching coffee demands while there are depleting water resources is a huge challenge.
On top of this, climate change is becoming another pain area for coffee farmers whose livelihood is completely dependent on coffee production. Drought, floods, and rising temperatures are some of the major challenges farmers are currently facing, regardless of location.
Environmental impacts on coffee produce are more evident than ever before, pushing the coffee sector to follow sustainable coffee farming.
Conclusion
Cultivation, processing, roasting, and consumption make up the four key stages of the coffee value chain. There are environmental, social, economic, and governance challenges that affect the long-term sustainability of coffee growing at each location.
The use of hazardous herbicides, pesticides, and the wasteful chopping down of trees have a negative impact on the environment.
With all the major challenges the coffee industry faces today, sustainable farming is the best solution for coffee producers. Implementing sustainable coffee farming is an inevitable move to tackle deteriorating environmental conditions, changing climate, and depletion of natural resources like water. With the rise of sustainable farming practices, coffee farmers are now getting better prices and coffee quality without damaging the environment.
