Instead I showed them fewsnet.net, a website all of them had paid for but none of them had ever visited, where this calendar marked the annual hunger season with the same kind of reliability as the annual rainy seasons.

FEWSNET, the Famine Early Warning System Network, is a project of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) funded by your tax dollars.  As the name indicates, it monitors hunger in countries that are chronically food-insecure or vulnerable to famine in order to avoid humanitarian catastrophes.

FEWSNET is one U.S. government-funded program that is playing a vital role in planning the response to the current coffee leaf rust crisis in Central America.  But it is not the only one.

FEWSNET: Coffee Labor Migration Maps

The calendar I shared at SCAA back in 2010 didn’t just chart the annual hunger season–it also showed how the annual coffee harvest generates “high demand for unskilled labor” between October and March.  The annual coffee harvest is one of the most reliable sources of employment in the coffeelands of Central America.  But thanks to this year’s coffee leaf rust epidemic , there wasn’t enough work to go around.  Official statistics say that 441,000 people lost their jobs in the coffee sector this year.  If current projections for higher production losses next harvest are accurate, the job-loss figure will be much higher in 2014.

FEWSNET is working now to produce maps to show where seasonal labor for the harvest comes from.  Why?  So we will all know which communities will be at greatest risk of food crises next year if labor demand falls by 30-40 percent, as FEWSNET predicts.   These resources are still under development, but they are already mark an exceptional contribution to understanding the labor dynamics in the coffeelands.

• El Salvador

• Guatemala

• Nicaragua

USDA FOREIGN AGRICULTURAL SERVICE: Global Agriculture Information Network Coffee Rust Summit Report

Ready for some acronyms?  Another valuable source of information from the coffeelands are the Global Agriculture Information Network (GAIN) reports published by the Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).  They may be best known as reliable sources for independent production estimates but they also generate periodic special reports on issues affecting production or the market, including coffee leaf rust.

Henry Schmick is an agricultural economist with the USDA FAS Guatemala bureau who participated in last month’s coffee rust summit.  He published this extraordinary summary of the proceedings, easily the best account I have seen.  It includes profiles of intergovernmental agencies, research institutes and coffee programs that are not well-known to most U.S. audiences but will have a central role in the coordinated response to coffee rust.  The report is so good that I didn’t bother writing my own, opting instead to forward this one to my colleagues.

WORLD COFFEE RESEARCH: Coffee Rust Summit Major Findings and Recommendations

OK, so this document was not funded by public resources, but it is now publicly available. World Coffee Research has compiled these major findings and recommendations from last month’s coffee rust summit.

THE ECONOMICS of the SMALLHOLDER COFFEE FARM

There are certain data points related to the social and economic impacts of coffee leaf rust that have gotten a lot of play in the news media, including these: $548 million in missed income opportunities for coffee growers and 441,000 jobs lost. 

The most important data point no one is talking about in Central America?  77 percent. 

That is the percentage of smallholder farmers in Central America covered by a recent CRS survey who are completely reliant on coffee for income.  Only 23 percent reported having access to another income source.  Given this staggering dependence on the income they generate through the sale of coffee, these families should ensure they are minimizing their vulnerability to epidemics like coffee leaf rust.  This means diversifying the genetic stock of their coffee fields and planting more rust-resistant varieties.  They should also begin working to generate more of their income from other sources, both on and off the farm.

DIVERSIFYING COFFEE GENETICS

Central America’s coffeelands are planted mostly with traditional cultivars that are descended from the Typica and Bourbon lines–cultivars whose genetics help make so many of the region’s coffees so extraordinary but also make them highly susceptible to coffee leaf rust.

Researchers have pointed to  F1 hybrids as a promising direction in Central America’s quest for coffee’s holy grail–cultivars that marry disease resistance with cup quality.  F1 hybrids are bred to achieve resistance to coffee rust and other production threats using only Arabica genetics.  These cultivars, however, are still years away from being commercially available on the scale needed now in the region.

In the meantime, there are rust-resistant alternatives available in Central America whose resistance to rust comes from Robusta genetics.  Catimors, created through crosses between the Caturra and the Timor Hybrid (itself a cross between Typica and Robusta), are in wide use throughout the region.  Locally developed hybrids in the Catimor line, such as IHCAFE 90 and Lempira in Honduras and ICAFE 90 and CR 95 in Costa Rica have effectively resisted coffee rust.

I have written here (and here and here) about the allegations that the Robusta genetics that give these hybrids their resistance to coffee leaf rust also make them inferior in the cup.  The verdict in that debate may still be out, but many of the farmers who renovate their coffee this year will look to these resistant varieties to minimize their production losses, taking their chances with quality-focused buyers who prefer the taste of susceptible varieties.

DIVERSIFYING FARM PRODUCTION

The 77 percent figure mentioned above speaks to the screaming need for farmers to change production patterns on their farms in ways that make them and their families more resilient.

This may involve producing more food–with coffee production and income down in Central America, strong maize and bean harvests will be more important than ever in keeping families free from hunger.

It may involve producing more nutritious food–diversifying beyond staple crops to include small livestock, leafy greens and fruits and vegetables that provide the animal-source proteins and micronutrients so often deficient in the coffeelands of Central America.

It will almost certainly involve generating more income from farming activities other than coffee growing.  For me, the most exciting complementary income sources are the ones compatible with coffee-based agroforestry–activities that allow farmers to create financial capital and without destroying natural capital.  Bananas, citrus, beekeeping, cacao and spices are just a few of the leading options we have explored to good effect in our efforts to help coffee farmers diversify income sustainably.

But the income potential for a 2-hectare farm is limited, even under the best circumstances.  The long-term viability of smallholder farms may depend increasingly on income generated from non-farming activities.

DIVERSIFYING OFF-FARM INCOME SOURCES

There is an excerpt from the excellent volume “Confronting the Coffee Crisis” that has haunted me since I first read it years ago, precisely because it exposes the intellectual poverty of an approach to diversification that stops at the farm’s edge.

It is important to move beyond the conventional agronomic response to coffee crises, which has sought to support farmers by diversifying the crops within coffee plantations. Examples of this include intercropping bananas, oranges or timber with existing coffee and shade trees. This response has been continuously repeated through cyclical coffee price crises since the 1930s, with very limited success. To move beyond crop diversification and into livelihood diversification it is necessary to start with a deeper understanding of the current farm household characteristics and strategies.This knowledge forms the basis for a process, which is led by farmers and their organizations, to seek diversified livelihood strategies that go beyond coffee production.

There are good reasons why most efforts to strengthen the livelihoods of coffee farmers are limited to crop diversification.  It is what most people hanging out in the coffeelands know best–farmers, coffee institutes, roasters and importers, non-profits working on agricultural development.  And non-agricultural rural income generation is a tough nut to crack.  But the most resilient households in the coffeelands over the long-term will likely be the ones whose non-agricultural income insulates them from the increasing threats to production in an era of climate change and the volatility of global agricultural markets.

I was confused.

He elaborated: “It’s a line from one of her songs: ‘Who run this mother?’”

It looks like we will know the answer soon–the UN is hiring a coordinator for the coffee rust emergency response program, and it is moving fast.  Candidates have just a week to submit their applications.

See the terms of reference here.

For more information regarding this opportunity, contact Miguel Gómez, Director of the Regional Unit for Sustainable Rural Development in Central America and the Dominican Republic at mrgomez@ruta.org.

CIAT, the International Center for Tropical Agriculture, has been at the leading edge of research into the impacts of climate change on coffee in Central America.  Its key findings include:

• Increasing temperatures will push the optimal elevation for coffee higher, reducing the overall area suitable for production of specialty-grade Arabica coffees.
• Farmers at the lower bounds of Arabica coffee production today will not likely be viable producers of specialty-grade Arabica for much longer.
• At a higher band of elevation, farmers may remain viable participants in the specialty coffee trade but will need to adapt their farming systems to mitigate the impacts of higher temperatures and changes in precipitation on coffee production and quality.
• Coffee will gradually become viable in areas currently too high for its production.
• In the absence of improved farming practices and better shade management, rising temperatures will speed the maturation of coffee beans at all elevations and negatively impact cup quality.  In regions where Denomination of Origin appellations attest to the distinctiveness and consistence of specific cup profiles, changes in coffee quality could reduce the value of coffee or threaten Denomination of Origin status altogether.
• In the areas of coffee flux — lower elevations where farmers are leaving coffee and higher elevations coming into production — changes in land-use patterns pose significant risks for Mesoamerican ecosystems, especially if farmers raze low-elevation coffee forest for pasture or cropland or poorly manage the transition from rustic high-elevation conservation forests to coffee production.
• At lower elevations where coffee may cease to thrive, other tree crops will be suitable for production even as climate change advances, including cacao and fruit trees.
• The impacts of climate change are highly site-specific; the most effective adaptation plans will be highly localized.

While we were implementing our CAFE Livelihoods project in Mesoamerica, Green Mountain Coffee Roasters funded a collaboration between CIAT and CRS to bring this science to the field.  The CUP project — Coffee Under Pressure: Climate Change Adaptation in Mesoamerica — assessed the vulnerability of smallholder coffee farmers to the expected impacts of climate change and helped them develop community-based strategies for adapting to it.

Banks and governments and industry are working now on plans for massive investment to renovate the coffeelands in Mesoamerica.  If those investments are to generate strong returns, more of this kind of work is needed.

One issue that did not get a lot of airtime: the implications of coffee rust for Central America’s fragile ecosystems.

Central America is one of the most biodiverse regions on the planet.  Unfortunately, it also has one of the highest rates of deforestation.  Coffee, a crop that grows in the forest understory, has provided a powerful incentive for farmers to conserve the region’s dwindling forests — forests that replenish groundwater, help prevent natural disasters and sequester carbon, among other things.  But that will only be true as long as coffee remains economically viable for the farmers who grow it.

Coffee farmers in Central America are struggling now as a result of coffee rust. Next year is likely to be worse.  Coffee institutes in the region have estimated productions losses 2-3 times higher next year.  If those projections hold, many coffee farmers will leave coffee.  Raze their forests.  And convert their farms to cropland or pasture.  These changes in land-use will threaten scarce natural resources and accelerate climate change in a region that is already among the most affected.

We are getting reports from the field in Central America that the process may already be getting underway.

If the coffee rust epidemic is a symptom of underlying agronomic and institutional failures, then its economic and social impacts on farmers are symptoms of the underlying economic vulnerability of coffee-growing households.

Even before the coffee rust epidemic, coffee farmers — particularly the smallholder farmers CRS works with — were facing extraordinary financial pressures due to production risk on the farm and price risk in the marketplace.

On the farm.

• Small farms are getting smaller.  In many cases, small coffee farms are getting even smaller over time through inheritance, subdivision and the occasional sale of land to meet acute cash needs.  In order for farmers to squeeze the same amount of coffee income out of farms that are getting smaller, they need to achieve greater efficiencies and higher yields in smaller areas. Unfortunately, many smallholder farms are moving in the opposite direction.

• Productivity is lagging.  Thanks to the issues cited above — aging plantations and poor farm management — productivity is lagging throughout Mesoamerica, and the region’s coffee institutes have had limited success in helping farmers reverse the slide.

• Pathways for pests and pathogens.  Under these conditions, pests and diseases thrive.  A plant’s natural defenses wane over time.  Only effective pest and disease management can compensate for a plant’s age.  Aging plants coupled with poor farming practices paves the way for pests and pathogens.  Add climate change to the mix, and we have a perfect storm for plagues and epidemics.  As climate change accelerates, the threats to coffee production will only multiply.

• Coffee is king.  Coffee growers have not diversified their production or their income streams enough to be resilient in the face of crises like the coffee rust outbreak.  CRS is conducing a survey of the impacts of coffee rust on smallholder farmers in Central America.  So far we have interviewed leaders from 13 cooperatives with more than 6,800 members.  The data show that an average of only 23 percent of their members had access to income-generating activities besides coffee farming.  But many coop leaders told us that the overwhelming majority of their members — 90-95 percent — are entirely dependent on coffee for their incomes, and therefore highly vulnerable to shocks to production.  Smallholder farmers’ exposure to risk is hardly lower in the marketplace.

In the marketplace.

• Rising costs of inputs.  The costs of agricultural inputs are on the rise.

• Multiplier effect.  Rising costs of inputs create a multiplier effect on costs of production when combined with falling productivity.  Farmers face a number of fixed costs in producing coffee — costs that don’t change regardless of how much coffee they produce.  So when farmers bring less coffee to the market thanks to falling production or epidemics of diseases like coffee rust, it costs them more to produce each unit.  In order to remain profitable, farmers need to cover rising costs of production with increases in the prices they earn at market.  In recent years, it has been hard to count on the market to deliver steadily rising returns.

• Extreme market volatility.  For factors unrelated to the amount of money it costs a farmer to produce one, the price of a pound of coffee has fluctuated wildly in recent years, increasing the risk to farmers who need high prices to break even.

The economics of the small-scale family coffee farm were already highly precarious before the coffee rust crisis.  Some coffee growers may choose to throw in the towel in the face of the current crisis.  Those who don’t will be more resilient if they can diversify some of their production out of coffee to hedge their risk, diversify their new coffee plantations between susceptible and disease-resistant varieties as a further hedge against risk, and manage their farms toward the higher yields they need to achieve and sustain profitability.  Building stronger coffee programs throughout Central America will be critically important in helping them achieve these goals.

SUSTAINABILITY.

Sustainability is a central conceit in the narrative of specialty coffee.  And the sustainability of specialty coffee is rooted unambiguously in its relationships — relationships based on direct communications, transparency, dialogue, mutual respect, mutual commitment to quality, and pursuit of mutual benefit.  Specialty coffee has emphasized the quality of its relationships as a source of both differentiation from the commercial trade and innovation in the name of sustainability.  As it turns out, the footprint of the current coffee rust epidemic overlaps with the map of some of the most important innovations in sustainable coffee.

Mesoamerica was the origin of Fair Trade in coffee.  It is where pioneering roasters began training farmers in coffee cupping — an initiative that simultaneously accelerated gains in coffee quality and farmer empowerment.  And it is currently home to countless collaborations between growers and roasters to improve the quality of coffee and the quality of life for coffee communities.  But today, the very relationships that have given rise to some of the leading innovations in sustainability are being strained by coffee rust.

In his closing remarks at last week’s Coffee Rust Summit in Guatemala, the SCAA’s Ric Rhinehart said that Central America’s farmers have been “relentlessly buffeted” by production threats and market volatility.  He suggested that in the face of coffee rust, many are asking themselves whether they will stay in coffee.  He also argued that industry can affect the decisions they make.

How?

By recommitting to the relationships that have made Central America such an important part of coffee’s sustainability story and committing commercially to make the coffee trade economically viable for farmers.

ORIGIN.

Over the past quarter-century, specialty coffee has elevated both the quality of our coffee and our appreciation of origin.  Thanks to continuous improvements in the way our coffee is sourced, roasted and prepared, there has never been a better time to be a coffee drinker.  Thanks to the way that specialty leaders have communicated around these innovations, there has never been a deeper appreciation of the fact the fine coffees we enjoy are unique.  Irreplaceable.

We understand not just the general differences in cup profile between Ethiopia, Indonesia and Guatemala, but that the way our coffee expresses itself in the cup is the result of an endless range of variation in the regional, community and farm levels.

We understand in a way we didn’t just a generation ago that each harvest, every farmer produces a coffee that is distinctive.  Different from the coffees of her neighbors. Different from the coffee she produced last harvest and the coffee she will produce next harvest.

And we understand that the relationships that have driven continuous improvement in sustainability are also responsible for continuously expanding our knowledge of the origins of our coffee.

PIETIES OR PRINCIPLES?

The coffee rust crisis in Central America will test the strength of the relationships on which the specialty coffee enterprise is built and the validity of the concept of origin. Will coffee buyers cut and run in Central America, seeking similar cup profiles from growers in other, lower-cost origins?  Or will they double-down in Central America, reconfirm their commitment to relationships and fight to save irreplaceable coffees that are endangered by coffee rust?  The way industry answers these questions will show us whether the concepts sustainability and origin are empty pieties or guiding principles.

Based on the conversations last week in Guatemala, I am optimistic.

EXECUTIVES’ SUMMARIES.

How the executive directors of some of the world’s leading coffee organizations framed the event.

• “This is not a typical conference where you come to sit and learn.  It is much more oriented toward finding solutions.”

– Tim Schilling, Executive Director, World Coffee Research

• We have the resources, knowledge and will to control coffee rust.

– Elsa Murano, Executive Director, Norman Borlaug Institute for International Agriculture

• “Lasting solutions will require collaboration between public and private sector actors all along the coffee chain…The private sector is not capable of addressing this crisis alone.  And governments can’t do it alone in a world that is ever more complex and specialized.”

– Roberio Oliveira Silva, Executive Director, International Coffee Organization

• “This kind of event represents the best hope we have to address not just coffee rust but all the shared challenges we face.”

– Ric Rhinehart, Executive Director, Specialty Coffee Association of America

• “We are anxious to work with coffee farmers as partners in a common cause: protecting the well-being of the Central American coffee community.”

– Robert Nelson, President and CEO, National Coffee Association

• “Coffee rust is a symptom of the problems our coffee sectors face in the region.”

– Armando García, Executive Secretary, PROMECAFE

THE IMPACTS.

• 2.3 million 60-kilo sacks in lost production
• $550 million in lost farmer income
• 500,000 jobs lost

UNDERLYING PROBLEMS.

Aging coffee plantations.

• 60 percent of the coffee in Honduras is older than 20 years.  (IHCAFE Executive Director Víctor Hugo Molina)
• 30-40 percent of the coffee in Costa Rica is older than 30 years (ICAFE Executive Director Ronald Peters)
• We have coffee that is 80 years old.  (CODOCAFE Executive Director José Núñez; He later told me that he is 53 years old.  He started working on his grandfather’s coffee farm when he was 7 or 8 years old, and his family is still farming the coffee he harvested as a boy.)

Limited institutional capacity.

• Honduras’ coffee institute has 120 coffee agronomists.
• Guatemala’s has 117.

THE SCIENTISTS.

• “An epidemic is a race between a plant and a pathogen.”
• “Climate change was the detonator.”
• “Shade coffee resisted rust more effectively than sun-grown coffee.”
• “Now is the time to renovate.”

 – Jacques Avelino, Coffee Rust Pathologist,  CIRAD-CATIE

• “Many people said there was not enough warning.  There was some warning.  It started in 2010.”
• “All non-resistant varieties were affected, including Catimor.  Could we be seeing breakdown of resistance?  It does happen.”
•  ”In summary — it’s complicated.”

  – Peter Baker,  Coffee Agronomist, CABI

ON MANAGING COFFEE RUST.

Using resistant varieties

• “We do not think moving to resistant varieties is the only answer.”

– Anacafé

Organically

• “I don’t know how organic coffee can have a future.  There is nothing that works to control rust in the field and I am not seeing anyone in the market offering more to create additional  incentives for organic farmers.”

– Miguel Medina, Anacafé

Conventionally

•  ”Fungicides are like a car.  If you drive a car at 50km an hour, it is safe.  If you drive at 200 km, it is not.”

– Marco Dutra, Syngenta

• production is down by 31 percent
• coffee income is down by even more since market prices are lower than they were last year — farmers have less coffee to bring to market and are earning less for every pound they did produce
• only 25 percent of members have access to other sources of income beyond coffee, and many cooperatives reported that their members depend almost exclusively on coffee for income

This news is bad.  But the prospects for next year may be even worse.

One of the cooperative leaders we interviewed in El Salvador told us: “The crisis is in 2014.” 

Unfortunately, the experts arrayed here yesterday at the coffee rust summit agreed.

Our data show that cooperatives believe their production will fall even further next year, by as much as 56 percent.  That figure includes both losses to coffee rust and the coffee that farmers will voluntarily take out of production over the short term to restore productivity over the medium term through pruning and renovation.

But the negative impacts of coffee rust aren’t just felt on the farm.

With less coffee to harvest, farmers hire fewer people to pick coffee — historically a reliable source of employment for countless thousands of seasonal workers, many of them migrant laborers from areas outside the coffeelands.  Experts here estimate that demand for seasonal labor in the coffee sector could be down as much as 30-40 percent next year, and that permanent jobs could be eliminated if the pessimistic projections for production hold.

With limited sources of income beyond coffee for farmers and jobs in the coffee sector drying up, production of food for household consumption assumes added importance.  Fortunately, 2012 harvests were strong and the outlook for 2013 is positive, so far.

CRS began working in coffee just over 10 years ago in response to a crisis.  Today the coffee sector finds itself coping with another crisis.  As I prepare for four days of meetings here in Guatemala to plan a coordinated response to the coffee rust epidemic in Central America, I try to remember that challenges and opportunities are two sides of the same coin.

THEN: THE COFFEE CRISIS.

Coffee has always been through periods of boom and bust, but what happened beginning in 2000 was something different. 

The prices farmers earned for their coffee fell to their lowest levels in a generation – less than $0.50 per pound.  Sometimes much less.  Farmers we began supporting in Nicaragua in the wake of the crisis reported farm-gate prices as low as $0.18 per pound.  But those were the nominal prices.  Economists suggested that the real prices – what that coffee income could buy farmers after adjusting for inflation – were the lowest they had been in a century.  It was bad. 

Coffee-growing families saw their incomes halved overnight (or worse) due to market forces beyond their control.  Farmers struggled to feed their families.  Some gave up on coffee.  Others gave up on farming altogether and migrated in search of work.  The impacts of the price collapse were so severe that the episode became known simply as “the coffee crisis.”

NOW: THE COFFEE RUST CRISIS.

Today, the coffee sector is in crisis again.  This time the crisis is driven not by what is happening in the marketplace, but by what is happening in the coffeelands.  Coffee leaf rust has reached epidemic proportions in Central America.  As much as 70 percent of Central America’s coffee fields are affected.  Production losses for this harvest exceed 100 million pounds.  Farmers have lost hundreds of millions of dollars in revenues due to low production.  And hundreds of thousands of jobs have been lost as there is less coffee to pick, process and export.  Estimates of missed revenues are north of $1 billion. 

The humanitarian impacts of the coffee rust epidemic on vulnerable farm families are have still not come into full view.  Farmers still have money they earned during the recent harvest, but we know from our experience in the field – and the pioneering research conducted by Green Mountain and CIAT – that money doesn’t last long.  Coffee-growing families quickly settle into the long lean season between the coffee and staple crop harvests, when cash flows slow to a trickle and families routinely cope with food scarcity.  The early indications are that we will not see famine or acute suffering this year, but with official data suggesting that coffee rust could have twice the impact next harvest, I worry that we may be watching a humanitarian crisis unfold in slow motion.  One cooperative leader we interviewed in El Salvador told us with certainty that “The crisis will be in 2014.”

Today I am in Guatemala City to participate in four days of meetings with a broad range of actors – national governments, research institutes, coffee roasters, non-profit agencies, banks, coffee certifiers and others – trying to develop a strategy for coordinated action to mitigate the negative impacts of the current crisis and help vulnerable family farmers prepare for the next one.

REFLECTIONS ON “CRISIS”

In preparation for the meetings, I have been reflecting on the idea of crisis, trying to remember that challenges and opportunities are two sides of the same coin.  The last crisis caused a lot of suffering in the coffeelands, but it also created opportunities.  It awakened many actors to the social and economic realities of life in the coffeelands – not just coffee consumers, but even importers and roasters who were engaged in the trade but perhaps didn’t fully understand the challenges a small-scale farming family faces.  It catalyzed innovation, unleashing a wave of creative initiatives to make the coffee trade more sustainable.  It drove the phenomenal growth of the U.S. Fair Trade market, as roasters and consumers sought opportunities to be part of the solution through purchases that generated more benefits for farmers and their communities.

Last month I wrote at length about possible silver linings in the coffee rust crisis: the recognition of the urgent need for more investment in renovation, research and extension. But I find myself thinking more broadly, more optimistically today than I did then, partly because of the energy and commitment to support farmers I felt among industry leaders at last week’s SCAA Symposium and Expo.

Before the coffee rust crisis, we had already begun to recognize the shortcomings of the leading approaches to sustainable coffee and started working to refresh the concept of sustainability.  My hope is that the coffee rust crisis will force everyone in the industry to look again, long and hard, at the underlying economics of the 1-2 hectare coffee farm.  That the way we talk about and measure sustainability may be losing relevance when smallholder coffee farmers selling “sustainable” coffees are coping with hunger 3-8 months a year.  That we will see in response to the current crisis the same kind of creativity and commitment that we did in response to the last one.  That a new generation of coffee leaders will use the coffee rust crisis to push the trade beyond its current frame of reference toward a vision of sustainability 2.0.