Coffee drives tropical deforestation, but it doesn’t have to

Roughly a billion people enjoy coffee daily, and more than 100 million people rely on it for income. However, the coffee industry is the sixth-largest driver of deforestation and is also rife with human rights abuses, including the labor of enslaved persons and children. But it doesn't have to be this way, says this guest on the Mongabay Newscast.

Etelle Higonnet is the founder of the NGO Coffee Watch, having formerly served as a senior adviser at the U.S. National Wildlife Federation. The main commodity on her radar now is coffee. On this podcast episode, she explains how the industry can — and should — reform its practices.

"It's so simple … pay a living [a] living income wage," she says, " and a lot of human rights violations will just dry up."

To target deforestation, Higonnet says the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) is "a beautiful law" that "simply put, would bar imports of coffee into the European Union if that coffee is tainted by deforestation or illegality. So, two things that are illegal off the top of my head are slavery and child labor."

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Image Credit: A cup of coffee with beans and a teaspoon on a stump tabletop. Image by Anja (cocoparisiene) from Pixabay (Pixabay Content License).

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Timecodes

(00:00) Coffee tied to slavery and deforestation

(07:03) How we can stop it

(12:36) Why are prices soaring?

(19:25) How the EUDR can help

(25:56) When will the EUDR come into effect?

(29:40) Why the coffee supply chain is simple

(33:54) What about certification schemes?

(37:46) What coffee drinkers can do to act