A SPLASH OF CLIMATE INFORMATION WITH THAT COFFEE

CLIMATE A Splash of Climate Information with that Coffee

It’s enough to give coffee farmers, buyers, and drinkers the jitters: a yellow powder that appears on the leaves of coffee plants, causing defoliation and reduced yields. The culprit, a fungal disease called Hemileia vastatrix, more commonly known as coffee leaf rust, cost Central American growers about $345 million in losses in the 2012–13 harvest season alone, and worldfamous Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee calculated losses of more than $1 million. Now, University of Arizona researchers and a team of other scientists are steeped in an effort to document whether climate information and communication, tailored and reformulated to meet specific needs and circumstances, can help the Jamaican growers stem the spread of the disease and deliver their cups of joe. “Coffee leaf rust hit livelihoods hard,” said Zack Guido, a program manager for the International Research and Application Project (IRAP), which is leading the research and is funded by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and U.S. Agency for International Development. “This project is looking at whether climate information can help improve the management of coffee leaf rust and whether we can quantify that.” Coffee is one of Jamaica’s most important agricultural exports after sugar. The country exported more than $13.8 million in coffee beans in 2012, according to the Jamaican Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries. After coffee leaf rust spread to Jamaica in 1986, growers used chemicals to keep it in check. Experts suspect that when coffee prices began to decrease several years ago, growers saved money by cutting back on chemical sprays and fertilizer. That left many plants more vulnerable to the fungus. In 2012, a particularly active year for coffee leaf rust, about 35 percent of the plants were affected. The research team includes scientists from Columbia University’s International Research Institute for Climate and Society and local partners like the Jamaican Coffee Industry Board, Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture, the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology, and the University of the West Indies at Mona. Representatives from each group met in Jamaica for three days in February 2015 to talk to farmers, agricultural extension services, and coffee buyers to learn more about the coffee leaf rust problem and potential management solutions. “Climate information has the potential to help inform management decisions, but its application does not occur in a vacuum,” said Jim Buizer, director of the climate adaptation and international development program at IE and a co-director of the IRAP project. “It is important to understand what farmers currently do to manage coffee leaf rust in order to get a better sense of how climate information can be helpful.” From the meetings in Jamaica, the team brewed up a three-step plan that involves identifying the best climate information that farmers can use, ensuring that information is a good fit for the farmers, and evaluating the impact of the climate information on coffee yields and networks that pinpoint the effect the co-developed climate information has had on managing coffee leaf rust.

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COFFEE FARMERS IN MAFOOTA VILLAGE, JAMAICA, ARE ORGANIZED INTO A COOPERATIVE AND SUPPLY THE HOTEL SECTOR IN THE ST. JAMES AREA. PHOTO CREDIT: FRANCESCO FIONDELLA, INTERNATIONAL RESEARCH INSTITUTE FOR CLIMATE AND SOCIETY.