I work for a non-profit-organization whose mission is to support communities in becoming more resilient and improving the management of their natural resources to become more sustainable. We do this in part by helping farmers to earn living incomes – this means helping to ensure that all household members have a decent standard of living […]
My colleague Jefferson Shriver is an advisor on issues of agroenterprise and climate change for CRS programs in Latin America and the Caribbean. He is based in Nicaragua, where he has lived and worked on-and-off for the better part of 20 years. Over that time, he has collaborated with many of the country’s leading coffee […]
Root Capital was established in 1999 to serve the grassroots enterprises that occupy the “missing middle” of financial markets in less-developed countries: they are too big for microfinance organizations and perceived as too small and risky by commercial banks. The organization’s success suggests that the scope of the need and opportunity in the missing middle […]
Since early August, I have published at least one post per week on the relationship between coffee and water resources. In several of those posts I have made mention of coffee’s “water footprint” without much exploration of the concept. According to this excellent study, coffee’s water footprint is 140 liters (or 37 gallons) per cup. […]
There are many water-efficient technologies currently in use by farmers selling their coffee into specialty markets. And there are some good reasons why there is still a relatively modest embrace of those technologies. What will it take for more farmers to “blue” their post-harvest processes?
In the search for technologies that can reduce the water footprint of coffee, we may not have to look too far.
