Climate change has harmed not only environment and animals but also human's life. As people know, Brazil is the largest coffee producer in the world. Many other countries import Brazil's good quality product and enjoyed. However, rise in global temperature has a negative impact on coffee farms.

Coffee rust called la roya, disease has spread widely across Central America and infected coffee plantation. Warm weather helps fungus (la roya) thrive, which attacks the leaves of coffee bush. In particular, the Arabica beans that occupy about 70% of coffee produce in Brazil has been affected by even 1degree rise on temperature because their proper temperature is between 18c and 22c.

Many people living in Central America has income from their small coffee farms in rural areas and depends on it. The loss in coffee production due to fungus outbreak leads to hiring less coffee picker, paying not enough wages, raising coffee price.

When is the first appearance of Coffee rust? The advent of la roya was in 1970 , which caused by the climate change. Usually coffee farms located in higher altitude above from 800meteres to 1200meters but the fungus was able to reach coffee leaves in this area because weather helped them.

Fortunately, there is good news! There are roya-resistance trees planted in Colombia. These trees named Castillo roya-resistant tree will be prepared to distribute their seedlings to famers across the South America. Furthermore, there are emergency programs that agronomist visit the coffee farms and help them against roya.

Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation