Tag: climate resilience

Africa’s Coffee Leaders Launch Climate Transformation Plan in Addis

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Addis Ababa – Qahwa World × Buna Kurs

African governments, international institutions, and private sector leaders convened today in Addis Ababa for the High-Level Policy Forum held during the Third African Coffee Week. The assembly issued a strong call for coordinated action to safeguard the future of Africa’s coffee sector amid escalating climate and market pressures.

Organized by the Inter-African Coffee Organisation (IACO)—the African Union’s specialized agency for coffee—in collaboration with UNIDO, the Forum is being held under the theme: “Advancing Climate Resilience and the Transformation of the African Coffee Sector.” The event, hosted at the Skylight Hotel, brings together ministers, ambassadors, development partners, regulators, researchers, and industry executives from across Africa and beyond.

In the opening session, senior representatives of the Ethiopian government, IACO member states, the African Union, UN agencies, and international partners underscored the strategic importance of coffee to Africa’s economies and export earnings. While coffee supports millions of smallholder farmers across the continent, it faces growing risks from climate change, regulatory shifts, and limited local value addition.

The High-Level Policy Forum is anchored in the ACT Programme (Advancing Climate-Resilience and Transformation of the African Coffee Sector), a continental framework structured around five key pillars:

  1. Climate resilience

  2. Value addition and industrial transformation

  3. Compliance with international market standards

  4. Research, innovation, and knowledge sharing

  5. Social inclusion and sustainable livelihoods

Day One discussions focused on five outcome-oriented policy panels, each aimed at producing actionable recommendations and investment pathways:

  • The First Panel addressed social inclusion, emphasizing the need to place farmers, women, and youth at the center of sector transformation. Speakers highlighted inclusive business models, access to finance, and skills development as essential to long-term resilience in coffee-growing communities.

  • The Second Panel examined value addition, noting that Africa still exports the majority of its coffee as green beans. Panelists discussed the investments needed to expand local processing, roasting, and branding, specifically looking at opportunities under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).

  • The Third Panel was dominated by climate resilience and adaptation. Experts outlined climate-smart production systems, agroforestry, and the role of climate finance in supporting smallholder farmers, stressing that adaptation must move from pilot projects to scalable, financed solutions.

  • The Fourth Panel focused on research and innovation, calling for the integration of scientific data and digital tools into policymaking. Regional collaboration and South–South knowledge exchange were identified as key enablers of quality improvement.

  • The Final Panel addressed market access and compliance, with particular attention to the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR). Speakers discussed traceability systems and how harmonized African standards can transform compliance from a barrier into a competitive advantage.

The day concluded with the official launch of the African Coffee Sustainability Standards, led by the African Organisation for Standardisation (ARSO)—a milestone aimed at strengthening market access and regulatory alignment for African producers.

The High-Level Policy Forum continues tomorrow, focusing on consolidating policy recommendations and partnership commitments under the ACT Programme.

WFP Leads Project to Strengthen Coffee Farmers’ Resilience in Guatemala

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Dubai – Qahwa World

The World Food Programme (WFP) has released a report highlighting the results of the Resilient Coffee-Growing Communities project in Guatemala’s Dry Corridor, designed to help farmers adapt to climate change and improve food security.

The report notes that the Dry Corridor is increasingly affected by unpredictable weather, with scorching, dry days that crack the soil and drain moisture from young plants, sometimes followed by sporadic nighttime rainfall. These extreme conditions have made it difficult for families to protect staple crops and ensure sufficient food.

The report highlights the experience of the Nájera Lorenzo family in Jalapa, who previously produced around 3,000 pounds of coffee per year—far below the level needed to meet basic household needs. With support from WFP, in partnership with the local organization Funcafé and funding from Starbucks Coffee Company, the family learned improved agricultural techniques, including shade management and early pest control, raising their coffee output to 13,000 pounds per cycle.

The project has also enabled families to establish home gardens. María Nájera, for example, manages a 430-square-foot garden where she grows Swiss chard, chipilín, radishes, and other vegetables. This garden has improved her family’s diet and generated additional income by selling surplus produce in local markets.

The report emphasizes that the project strengthens women’s roles in the community, supporting participation in savings and loan groups and empowering women to take on leadership roles. Farmers are also trained as climate monitors, collecting and interpreting local weather data to plan crop production more effectively and improve resource management, increasing resilience to climate variability.

According to WFP, the project has led to more diverse diets, increased household savings, better-organized and more productive plots, and the spread of knowledge to other families in the community, amplifying the project’s impact.

WFP stresses that this integrated approach improves food security and nutrition, strengthens the sustainability of coffee supply chains, and equips families to withstand climate shocks, contributing to Sustainable Development Goal 2: Zero Hunger.

The report concludes: “Every step toward building the resilience of farming families contributes to a future where every family can access sufficient, nutritious food and live with dignity and hope.”

Rainforest Alliance Launches First Regenerative Agriculture Certification for Coffee

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Dubai, 9 September 2025 (Qahwa World) – The Rainforest Alliance has announced the launch of the world’s first dedicated regenerative agriculture certification for coffee, a milestone that seeks to transform farming practices from simply reducing harm to actively restoring ecosystems and improving farmer livelihoods. The new “regenerative” seal is expected to appear on consumer coffee bags starting in 2026.

This initiative follows the release of version 1.4 of the Sustainable Agriculture Standard, which will take effect in October 2025. The revised standard reduces the number of requirements from 221 spread across seven categories to 148 requirements consolidated into three, making certification more straightforward for farmers while maintaining its credibility. Alongside this streamlining, certificate holders now have the option to add 17 regenerative requirements to their existing certification, or to pursue a standalone regenerative certification consisting of 119 requirements focused on soil health, biodiversity, water management, climate resilience, and farmer livelihoods.

The Rainforest Alliance has framed regenerative agriculture as a shift beyond a “do no harm” mindset toward one of repair and restoration. The new certification aims to make coffee part of an ecological recovery process that benefits both the land and the farming communities that depend on it. The organization emphasized that every future cup of coffee should give back more than it takes. A recent report by TechnoServe supported this view, finding that the transition to regenerative agriculture in key coffee-producing countries could significantly increase exports and raise farmer incomes.

Implementation of the new certification has already begun in coffee farms across Brazil, Costa Rica, Mexico, and Nicaragua. The first coffees carrying the regenerative seal are expected to reach international markets in 2026, targeting consumers who increasingly demand sustainable and credible products. The launch also coincides with sector-wide initiatives such as RegenCoffee, introduced by the Global Coffee Platform to create a common language around regenerative agriculture, further strengthening Rainforest Alliance’s leadership in this field.

Beyond the environmental and social dimensions, the development comes at a critical moment as the European Union’s deforestation-free supply chain law (EUDR) is set to take effect on 30 December 2025. The law will require companies to prove that commodities entering EU markets are not linked to deforestation. Observers note that the regenerative certification could provide companies with an essential tool to comply with these new requirements, especially in the coffee sector, which faces growing regulatory scrutiny.

Despite the enthusiasm, there are concerns that additional certification layers could impose extra burdens on smallholder farmers who already struggle with limited resources. The Rainforest Alliance has responded by stressing that the new standard was developed over years of research and consultation with farmers, companies, and civil society groups. The goal, it said, is not to increase burdens but to build long-term resilience and open new opportunities for market access.

By combining the streamlined Sustainable Agriculture Standard with the launch of the first regenerative certification for coffee, the Rainforest Alliance is signaling a strategic shift in its vision. The initiative goes beyond traditional sustainability frameworks, aiming to create a new agricultural model that balances environmental protection, agricultural economics, and social development. With this step, the global coffee sector enters a new chapter in which every cup of coffee is not just a beverage, but a contribution to restoring the planet and securing a more sustainable future.