In the 1960s, most coffee was Arabicas grown in the shade of rain forest trees. Arabica coffee are relatively an environmentally-friendly crops. It was traditionally grown under a canopy of rain forest shade trees amid other kinds of vegetation. The trees and plants fixed nitrogen in the soil and their leaves provided nutrients. Few chemical were used and the lush vegetation prevented erosion and provided a habitat for wildlife. In the 1960s and 1970s Arabica crops were devastated by the coffee leaf rust.
These days much of the coffee grown are high-yield robustas that grow well in open in sunny fields and were introduced to stop the spread of coffee leaf rust.. Robusta production requires large amounts of fertilizer and pesticides and has resulted in trees being chopped down and rivers and groundwater contaminated with chemicals from pesticides and fertilizers.
Millions of hectares of rain forests and cloud forests have been clear. Much of the land in the 25 highly threatened biodiversity hot spots designated by Conservation International are in or around coffee-growing areas. One study found that coffee plantations located near fragments of forests boosted their income because of the presence of pollinating bees.
The coffee genome was cracked after two years at an expense of $2 million. The Nara Institute of Science and Technology in Japan has developed genetically-engineered plants that produce coffee beans with 60 percent less caffeine. Many coffee growers don’t want these plants anywhere near their plants.
