COFFEE
Austin Bankos
Coffee is one of America’s most infamous drinks. Everywhere you look, you can spot a Starbucks or a Dunkin’ Donuts. However, it may be shocking to find out that the United States’ coffee availability has dropped by nearly 50% since the 1940s. In 1946, the USA peaked at 46.4 gallons per person. Compare that to 2005’s 24.2 gallons per person, and it is an insane drop off. This was most likely due to the American soldiers during World War II having coffee in their rations, which caused a mass demand for coffee companies. Once the soldiers returned home, they might’ve thought of it as an easy way for a quick pick-me-up (Buzby, LINK).
Header Image Source: Wikipedia
The United States has never been a massive producer of green coffee in the scheme of the entire world. Green coffee is essentially coffee beans that have not been roasted yet. The main exporters are typically countries in South America with countries such as Brazil leading the front lines. Going back to the United States, green coffee production has been relatively jumpy in the past 30 years. Throughout much of the late 90s to the 2010s, it has remained pretty stagnant with some drops in production. It wasn’t until 2020 that U.S. production hit above 4 million pounds of green coffee produced, with most of the production coming from Hawaii. This is because coffee beans typically need tropical and humid environments to be able to grow properly (FAOSTAT, LINK).
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In just about any supermarket, you can find the store’s coffee aisle. Over the weekend, I visited Giant grocery store on North Atherton and came across a couple of bags of coffee. These specific bags came from Costa Rica and Brazil. These countries are found around the equator. The ideal latitudes for growing coffee are 25 degrees north to 30 degrees south. This range of latitude is commonly referred to as “The Bean Belt” or the “Coffee Belt,” (NCA, LINK)
3 Coffee Articles Worth Reading
New York Times - Here’s What to Know About Trump’s 50% Tariffs on Brazil
a. The most appealing story to me was one found in the New York Times. it goes into detail discussing President Trump’s recent tariffs on Brazil’s coffee and beef exports. It explains how the 50% increase in tariffs affects coffee drinkers heavily in the United States, with prices likely to soar. Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts will face price increases. Brazil will also most likely find a new buyer of their coffee exports. The United States was their second biggest buyer. However, this most likely won’t affect their economy as much since a lot of Europe already has an interest in coffee. It’ll be a hit in their economy, but not as much as the beef tariff against Brazil.
New York Times - 10 Nutrition Lessons from 2025
b. In this article, it discusses the possibility that coffee is actually healthy for you. A study compared adults who drank coffee between ages 45 to 60 against adults the same age who did not drink coffee. The study found that the group that does drink coffee has less cognitive decline as they age. They also generally had better heart health.
New York Times - If Decaffeinated Coffee Bad for You
c. This article talks about the process coffee beans go through to get the caffeine stripped from them. Some people prefer not to consume excessive amounts of caffeine because they feel jittery or just simply want to enjoy coffee before bed and not struggle falling asleep. Essentially, the beans are soaked in methylene chloride to pull the caffeine out of the beans. They are then steamed and washed to clean up any extra chemicals left on the bean.
Carbon Footprint of Coffee
Coffee has a considerably high carbon footprint at around 0.4kg of CO2e. Converted to pounds, it averages around 0.88lbs of CO2e. Relative to milk, it is around half of its carbon footprint. A lot of coffee’s carbon footprint occurs before it leaves the farm, specifically 75% to 91% (CDP, LINK).