Kenya’s celebrated coffee under threat as farmers hit by climate changeKate StanworthIn the lush, volcanic highlands of Komothai in Kenya’s Rift Valley, farmers like Simon Macharia produce coffee on small plantations scattered across the hillsides.Along with other farmers, Mr Macharia brings sacks of his bright red coffee cherries to the local processing plant, where they are weighed and treated.A machine removes the red husks, and the pale beans inside are washed and passed along concrete channels, ending up on lines of drying platforms that sweep across the valley.Here, workers categorise the beans into grades, the highest destined for the coffee houses of Europe.”We call coffee the black gold around here,” Mr Macharia, whose farm covers 2.5 hectares (six acres) , told the BBC.He grows the Kenya AA coffee beans, which are prized worldwide for their high quality, full body, deep aromas and fruity flavour.Kate StanworthThe crop has been part of these lush highlands since the late 1890s, when British colonial settlers introduced it. Now, the area is famous for its unique, top-rated coffee.Growing the berries is labour intensive – picking, pruning, weeding, spraying, fertilising and transporting the products.”Coffee requires your full-time concentration, especially when it starts to bloom,” Mr Macharia said.”From that moment up until the day that you are going to harvest – those six months, your full-time job is on the farm.”The bean that could change the taste of coffeeCoffee price surges to highest on recordA coffee tree is a huge investment for cash-strapped farmers, as it can take four years for the fruits to mature.The price of a single cup of coffee in a chic European café, typically $4 (£3.20), highlights a stark disparity when compared to the earnings of many Kenyan coffee labourers, who make at most $2.30 a day.Edita Mwangi, who harvests coffee cherries on the red earth hillside overlooking the processing plant, confirms this.”They don’t know the poverty we suffer. You have to struggle day and night just to survive,” she said. With four children depending on her, Ms Mwangi works six days a week, earning about $1.40 a day. She has to walk 5km (three miles) to reach the farm where she works.Kate StanworthFarmers feel the trading system between Kenya and Europe – the world’s largest coffee market – has been stacked against them for many years.But now, a new threat looms, jeopardising farmers’ ability to make a living – climate change.Coffee trees are extremely sensitive to small differences in temperature and weather conditions. They also need specific climatic conditions like humid temperatures and ample rainfall to grow.”Climate change is a major challenge for our coffee farmers,” says John Murigi, the chairman of the Komothai Coffee Society, which represents 8,000 coffee farmers like Mr Macharia. Cold temperatures and erratic rainfall are having a devastating impact on the delicate coffee plants, said Mr Murigi. As a result, “coffee prod
Ven. Gen 10th, 2025
