There’s a worldwide coffee shortage.
Sorry, there was no easy way to tell you, so I came right out with it.
It’s climate change. Unseasonal and adverse weather in Brazil and Vietnam has meant the price of Arabica and Robusta coffee beans are climbing to record highs. And climate change, the increase and in some cases decrease of temperatures, wild storms, sudden frosts – well it’s making the beans taste different. More bitter.
And in some cases it’s wiping out whole crops.
Climate change is killing coffee! Why aren’t they telling us this?
Is there a coffee conspiracy? I suspect the tea people.
If you want to bring an end to fossil fuels, you have to tell people about the end of coffee.
They thought that ‘your children won’t have a future’ was a powerful message to drive home the urgency. But it just isn’t getting through. People aren’t that worried about what happens when they’re gone. But a future without coffee? Now that’s a truly unlivable planet.
They need to tell people. Even climate denialists would shit themselves.
Not even disinformation is palatable without a coffee in your hand.
End of your favourite coffee?
By 2050 experts believe that climate change could kill off our two main coffee varieties. There are 11 million daily coffee drinkers in Australia.
Over one billion worldwide. That billion consumes two and a half billion coffees a day.
That’s a lot of coffee. That’s a lot of cranky people with a coffee headache.
One billion people hanging out. One billion people who have nothing to look forward to when they wake up. I’m definitely one of them. That’s my cohort.
I can’t live without coffee. I’ve given up alcohol, ciggies, sugar, wheat. I don’t drink cow’s milk. I don’t take hard drugs. I barely take panadol. Coffee is my love. It’s a ritual. It’s what gets me out of bed to walk the beach – I grab a coffee first. It’s my morning routine. For decades I’ve met with a small group of friends in a cafe. It’s been like the cafe scene out of Seinfeld or Friends. I’ve always met someone for coffee at least a few times a week. It’s how I start friendships. It’s how I end them. It’s how I have meetings. ‘Want to meet for a coffee?’ It’s a low ask.
No one is meeting for water. That’s just weird.
‘Want to meet at 9am tomorrow for a water? You name the tap’.
The endangered bean
I never quite trust people who don’t drink coffee. I don’t know what to meet them for. They can have a dandy soy latte, but it’s already a bit of a disappointment. I have two coffees a day. They have to be good. Life is too short for bad coffee. One bad coffee can ruin my day.
Coffee is my reward
Hope, smells like coffee. It fills the house. It lingers on the furniture. It curls around the curtains. It’s better than any stinky candle.
It’s what puts me off international travel. No one makes a coffee as good as us. I remember sitting in Paris and thinking, this is gonna be good. It was awful. Australia has never celebrated their true world achievement. We make the best coffee in the world. Don’t even ask me about that awful American coffee. It’s an abomination. Percolating is disrespectful to the endangered bean. Aussies are world class baristas. I don’t know why, but we nailed it.
So this Summer you need to think long and hard about what lies ahead. About the end of coffee.
This may be the climate movement we’ve been waiting for.
One billion cranky coffee drinkers who woke up one day, and saved the world.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
