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GREEN COFFEE CARBON FOOTPRINT

Explainer: Accurately assessing the carbon footprint of coffee farming (CIRAD review)

Measurement of green coffee’s carbon footprint has traditionally varied, as is often the case for any agricultural lifecycle assessment. The Institute for Scientific Information on Coffee (ISIC) commissioned the French Agricultural Research Centre for International Development (CIRAD) to review current methodologies for green coffee, revealing a more precise picture of how to measure the environmental impact of the raw material used in one of the world’s most popular drinks.

Methodology

34

studies were included in the review, alongside agricultural guidelines on quantifying carbon footprints.

This was a representative sample of the varied ways in which coffee is grown worldwide.

72%

of farm systems were located in central and south America, which represents 70% of global coffee production.

49%

of studied cropping systems covered some form of agroforestry system.

67%

covered the wet process route, which was most common for Arabica.

The median carbon footprint was 3.6kg of CO2 equivalent emissions per kilogram of green coffee – which is equivalent to driving a car 30km or making over 100 espresso coffees.

Key variables and recommendations

The review highlighted that the total carbon footprint of green coffee can vary greatly depending on a number of key factors and approaches.

The main contributors to green coffee's carbon footprint were identified as:

  • Land Use Change – human-driven change in use of management of land.
  • Varying levels of nitrogen fertilizer usage
  • Coffee residues – from pruning, leaf litter and coffee husks
  • Wet process emissions – cleaning sorting, and drying of coffee cherries and beans

CIRAD's main recommendations to standardise and ensure accurate measurement of the carbon footprint of coffee farming were:

  • Clear guidance to identify representative measurements for different farm systems
  • Consistent application of a 20-year timeframe to examine land use changes
  • Clear guidance on how best to estimate total biomass (including roots) or other trees present in coffee systems
  • Guidance on how to accurately model and measure across trees in different phases of maturity. This is important because coffee is a perennial crop, which lives for years without replanting.
Please click here to read the review’s recommendations in full.