Agriculture and Environment: Commodities

Overview: Coffee (Coffea arabica, C. canephora, other species)

The coffee plant was originally found and cultivated by the Oromo people in the Kafa province of Ethiopia, from which it received its name.

Around 1000 A.D., Arab traders took coffee seeds home and started the first coffee plantations. The first known coffee shop was opened in Constantinople in 1475, and the idea quickly spread to other parts of Europe.

The ultimate meeting place - coffeehouses
England's King Charles II raged against coffeehouses as centres of sedition because they were the meeting place of writers and businessmen. Lloyd's insurance company was started in the back room of a coffeehouse in 1689.

In fact, coffee shops became centres of political and religious debate throughout the continent, and many were subsequently closed. The owners were often tortured.

Coffee's arrival in Europe
Coffee first arrived in Europe from Turkey via overland trade routes. It is not known exactly when coffee first arrived, but it had probably been there sometime before coffeehouses became common in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

It is possible that coffee was brought in along the same trade routes that were used to transport gold, valuable gums, and ivory from Africa and silk and spices from Asia. In any case, coffeehouses were already established in northern Europe with the sixteenth century arrival of cocoa, which then spread quickly as another coffeehouse drink.

From luxury to necessity
Over the centuries coffee has gone from a luxury to necessity. Globally, coffee consumption is increasing but not nearly as rapidly as production, so prices are decreasing. In 2002 real coffee prices reached historic lows. Many producers are abandoning coffee plantations; others are destroying them.

All of this is happening when markets in developed countries are fixated more than ever on high-quality coffee. While many consumers are willing to pay more for their coffee, they are actually drinking less of it. Furthermore, increased supply has not been followed by a commensurate decrease in price in most developed countries.