Two aspects of the climate impact of
coffee production were studied: the standing carbon stocks in the production systems
and the product carbon footprint. We collected data from 116
coffee farms in five Latin American countries for four coffee production
systems: (1) traditional polycultures, (2) commercial polycultures, (3)
shaded monocultures, and (4) unshaded monocultures. Polycultures were found to have a lower mean carbon footprint and much higher carbon stocks in the
vegetation than monocultures. Several other strategies were identified to reduce climate impacts of coffee
production, including diversification with
trees, use of their wood to substitute for fossil fuel and building materials, targeted use of fertilizer, and use of ecological processing instead of
the traditional fully washed process.
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