Advocating climate change on a green blog journey
Sustainable Solo cup is a green blog brimming with information on sustainability in the design of space. It talks about the most pressing environmental issues and their implications on the environment. Sustainable solo cup examines topics such as adaptive reuse, sustainable materials, and energy efficient sustainable strategies in buildings. |
If you are one of those people who need their cup of Joe before you get going every morning, then you might be in trouble in the near future. This international coffee day, Starbucks decided to expand their initiative from last year – “One tree for every bag” of coffee purchased to “donate a coffee tree for every cup of Mexico Chiapas brewed coffee” this year. These coffee plants are being distributed to those farmers who have been impacted by coffee rust in the continent of South America. As you all may know, Columbia is the second largest supplier of the Arabica followed by Brazil. In the year 2013, Guatemala grew 40 % less coffee than its usual production due to the unusual spread of coffee rust. Coffee rust is a fungus and its effects on the coffee plants are devastating. In the few years, Coffee rust started from a very isolated range of fungus to a full-fledged disease of the plants capable of crossing continents and rendering the coffee plants worthless. This has led many of the farmers to immigrate and sought out other forms of livelihood and others to plunge into poverty. The donated plants can be of great help to the farmers but, we also have to know that it takes 3 to 5 years for the coffee plants to start harvesting and in these 3 to 5 years, these farmers have no other source of income to live on. “We smallholder farmers have difficulty accepting that we have to remove the coffee plant because we feel that they are taking away a part of us, a piece of us.” — quotes José Luis Mateo Mendoza a coffee farmer in Guatemala. The drastic increase in coffee rust is due to climate change. Higher temperatures and long droughts followed by intense rainfall play a crucial part in coffee plantation growth. Climate change is affecting our life and it has affected the small farmer’s life. It is impacting the way the product is produced. It’s becoming more expensive and more difficult. And with every year passing their job gets harder. The product might become scantier and may even disappear at the end. All this is because of Climate change. I do appreciate Starbucks initiative to try and help out the farmers. But is there more we can do, other than just handing out plants and sympathize about these coffee farmers. I believe we can.
Behind that cup of coffee is the effort of many poor farmers. These farmers are the one to work with the earth every day. And they are working within an ever changing climate and they are the ones that feel the impact more than the one sipping down the hot latte. So if you share similar sentiments as me, please make sure to help these farmers in any way possible and come back here for more on similar issues.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorHarini Meda is a Interior designer based in San Francisco, California. Interested in Environmental Change advocacy and believes in leading a happy and a sustainable life . Archives
December 2016
Categories |