Shade Coffee: Update on a Disappearing Refuge for Biodiversity

In the past three decades, coffee cultivation has gained widespread attention for its crucial role in supporting local and global biodiversity. In this synthetic Overview, we present newly gathered data that summarize how global patterns in coffee distribution and shade vegetation have changed and discuss implications for biodiversity, ecosystem services, and livelihoods. Although overall cultivated coffee area has decreased by 8% since 1990, coffee production and agricultural intensification have increased in many places and shifted globally, with production expanding in Asia while contracting in Africa. Ecosystem services such as pollination, pest control, climate regulation, and nutrient sequestration are generally greater in shaded coffee farms, but many coffee-growing regions are removing shade trees from their management. Although it is clear that there are ecological and socioeconomic benefits associated with shaded coffee, we expose the many challenges and future research priorities needed to link sustainable coffee management with sustainable livelihoods.

[1]  G. Gilbert,et al.  Tree biodiversity in farmer cooperatives of a shade coffee landscape in western El Salvador , 2007 .

[2]  J. Hardner,et al.  Rethinking green consumerism. , 2002, Scientific American.

[3]  D. Wardle,et al.  Terrestrial Ecosystem Responses to Species Gains and Losses , 2011, Science.

[4]  Robert P. Anderson,et al.  Maximum entropy modeling of species geographic distributions , 2006 .

[5]  K. C. Willson,et al.  Coffee, Cocoa and Tea , 1999 .

[6]  N. Brown,et al.  A Landscape Approach to Biodiversity Conservation of Sacred Groves in the Western Ghats of India , 2005 .

[7]  Ivon Flamen.  Coffee, cocoa, and tea , 1989 .

[8]  J. Vandermeer,et al.  The effect of an ant-hemipteran mutualism on the coffee berry borer (Hypothenemus hampei) in southern Mexico. , 2006 .

[9]  J. Dempewolf,et al.  Towards a climate change adaptation strategy for coffee communities and ecosystems in the Sierra Madre de Chiapas, Mexico , 2009 .

[10]  C. Staver,et al.  Designing pest-suppressive multistrata perennial crop systems: shade-grown coffee in Central America , 2001, Agroforestry Systems.

[11]  Teja Tscharntke,et al.  Fruit set of highland coffee increases with the diversity of pollinating bees , 2003, Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences.

[12]  E. Somarriba,et al.  Shade management in coffee and cacao plantations , 2004, Agroforestry Systems.

[13]  Carlos Guadarrama-Zugasti.  A Grower Typology Approach to Assessing the Environmental Impact of Coffee Farming in Veracruz, Mexico , 2008 .

[14]  B. Jong,et al.  Carbon sequestration through agroforestry in indigenous communities of Chiapas, Mexico , 2009, Agroforestry Systems.

[15]  P. Gutman.  Confronting the Coffee Crisis: Fair Trade, Sustainable Livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mexico and Central America , 2009 .

[16]  A. Bosselmann.  Mediating factors of land use change among coffee farmers in a biological corridor , 2012 .

[17]  Aide Tm,et al.  Globalization, Migration, and Latin American Ecosystems , 2004, Science.

[18]  Jacques Avelino,et al.  The intensity of a coffee rust epidemic is dependent on production situations , 2006 .

[19]  C. Bacon,et al.  Agrobiodiversity and Shade Coffee Smallholder Livelihoods: A Review and Synthesis of Ten Years of Research in Central America , 2010 .

[20]  Dwayne A. Ball,et al.  Does Fair Trade Deliver on Its Core Value Proposition? Effects on Income, Educational Attainment, and Health in Three Countries , 2009 .

[21]  G. Gilbert,et al.  Cooperative management and its effects on shade tree diversity, soil properties and ecosystem services of coffee plantations in western El Salvador , 2009, Agroforestry Systems.

[22]  J. Laborde,et al.  The Landscape Approach , 2008 .

[23]  Paul F. Donald,et al.  Biodiversity Impacts of Some Agricultural Commodity Production Systems , 2004 .

[24]  J. Vandermeer,et al.  Impacts of coffee agroforestry management on tropical bee communities. , 2010 .

[25]  I. Perfecto,et al.  Shade over coffee: its effects on berry borer, leaf rust and spontaneous herbs in Chiapas, Mexico , 2002, Agroforestry Systems.

[26]  Gatt,et al.  Coffee, an Exporter's Guide , 2003 .

[27]  D. Raes,et al.  Environmental and socio-economic impacts of institutional reforms on the agricultural sector of Vietnam: Land suitability assessment for Robusta coffee in the Dak Gan region , 2005 .

[28]  N. Fenton.  The Personal Interview , 1934 .

[29]  Matthew D. Johnson,et al.  Ecological and Economic Services Provided by Birds on Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee Farms , 2008, Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology.

[30]  Víctor M. Toledo,et al.  Biodiversity Conservation in Traditional Coffee Systems of Mexico , 1999 .

[31]  H. Morales,et al.  Linking multi-temporal analysis and community consultation to evaluate the response to the impact of Hurricane Stan in coffee areas of Chiapas, Mexico , 2011 .

[32]  R. Lal,et al.  Carbon Sequestration , 2010 .

[33]  Raf Aerts,et al.  A global meta-analysis of the biodiversity and ecosystem service benefits of coffee and cacao agroforestry , 2013 .

[34]  R. Rice,et al.  Field‐Testing Ecological and Economic Benefits of Coffee Certification Programs , 2007, Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology.

[35]  R. Rice,et al.  Shade Coffee: A Disappearing Refuge for Biodiversity Shade coffee plantations can contain as much biodiversity as forest habitats , 1996 .

[36]  Yann Clough,et al.  Multifunctional shade‐tree management in tropical agroforestry landscapes – a review , 2011 .

[37]  Eric F. Lambin,et al.  Linking Globalization to Local Land Uses: How Eco-Consumers and Gourmands are Changing the Colombian Coffee Landscapes , 2013 .

[38]  M. Kinnaird,et al.  Caffeine and Conservation , 2003, Science.

[39]  Ernesto Illy,et al.  The complexity of coffee. , 2002, Scientific American.

[40]  Benoît Bertrand,et al.  Breeding for coffee quality , 2012 .

[41]  Kevin P. Gallagher,et al.  Organic and Fair Trade Markets in Mexico , 2022 .

[42]  R. Rice,et al.  A Review of Ecosystem Services, Farmer Livelihoods, and Value Chains in Shade Coffee Agroecosystems , 2011 .

[43]  S. Wunder,et al.  Designing payments for environmental services in theory and practice: An overview of the issues , 2008 .

[44]  William H. Ukers.  All About Coffee , 1993 .

[45]  J. Vandermeer,et al.  Bats Limit Insects in a Neotropical Agroforestry System , 2008, Science.

[46]  Charis Gresser,et al.  Mugged: Poverty in Your Coffee Cup , 2004 .

[47]  A. Jarvis,et al.  Mesoamerican coffee: building a climate change adaptation strategy , 2013 .

[48]  T. Aide,et al.  Globalization, Migration, and Latin American Ecosystems , 2004, Science.

[49]  José C. Ramalho,et al.  Impacts of drought and temperature stress on coffee physiology and production: a review , 2006 .

[50]  Laura T. Raynolds,et al.  Regulating sustainability in the coffee sector: A comparative analysis of third-party environmental and social certification initiatives , 2007 .

[51]  J. Avelino,et al.  Topography and crop management are key factors for the development of american leaf spot epidemics on coffee in costa rica. , 2007, Phytopathology.

[52]  T. Aide,et al.  Ecology. Globalization, migration, and Latin American ecosystems. , 2004, Science.

[53]  G. Kattan,et al.  Effects of Patch Size and Type of Coffee Matrix on Ithomiine Butterfly Diversity and Dispersal in Cloud‐Forest Fragments , 2009, Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology.

[54]  Nicolas Chaumont,et al.  Forest bolsters bird abundance, pest control and coffee yield. , 2013, Ecology letters.

[55]  H. Su,et al.  Tropical drying trends in global warming models and observations. , 2006, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[56]  S. Jha,et al.  Native bees mediate long-distance pollen dispersal in a shade coffee landscape mosaic , 2010, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[57]  Jason Potts,et al.  Seeking Sustainability: COSA Preliminary Analysis of Sustainability Initiatives in the Coffee Sector , 2008 .

[58]  C. Bacon,et al.  Effects of Fair Trade and organic certifications on small-scale coffee farmer households in Central America and Mexico , 2010, Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems.

[59]  R. Muschler.  Shade improves coffee quality in a sub-optimal coffee-zone of Costa Rica , 2004, Agroforestry Systems.

[60]  R. Reitsma,et al.  Bird Populations in Shade and Sun Coffee Plantations in Central Guatemala , 1997 .

[61]  J. Avelino,et al.  Shade is conducive to coffee rust as compared to full sun exposure under standardized fruit load conditions , 2012 .

[62]  J. Ocampo.  Globalización y desarrollo , 2002 .

[63]  S. Philpott,et al.  Arboreal Ant Abundance and Leaf Miner Damage in Coffee Agroecosystems in Mexico , 2008 .

[64]  Fergus L. Sinclair,et al.  Local knowledge of impacts of tree cover on ecosystem services in smallholder coffee production systems , 2012 .

[65]  Gretchen C Daily,et al.  Economic value of tropical forest to coffee production. , 2004, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[66]  C. Bacon.  Who decides what is fair in fair trade? The agri-environmental governance of standards, access, and price , 2010 .

[67]  Garry D. Peterson,et al.  Understanding relationships among multiple ecosystem services. , 2009, Ecology letters.

[68]  Carsten Smith Olsen,et al.  The influence of shade trees on coffee quality in small holder coffee agroforestry systems in Southern Colombia , 2009 .

[69]  J. Vandermeer,et al.  Synergies between Agricultural Intensification and Climate Change Could Create Surprising Vulnerabilities for Crops , 2008 .

[70]  Kevin P. Gallagher,et al.  Confronting the Coffee Crisis: Fair Trade, Sustainable Livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mexico and Central America , 2008 .

[71]  D. Kummer,et al.  Slash-and-Burn Agriculture: The Search for Alternatives , 2006 .

[72]  E. Somarriba,et al.  SHADE MANAGEMENT IN COFFEE AND CACAO PLANTATIONS- A REVIEW , 1997 .

[73]  P. Giungato,et al.  ENVIRONMENTAL AND SOCIO-ECONOMIC EFFECTS OF INTENSIVE AGRICULTURE: THE VIETNAM CASE , 2008 .

[74]  M. Noordwijk,et al.  Research, part of a Special Feature on Compensation and Reward for Environmental Services in the Tropics Principles for Fairness and Efficiency in Enhancing Environmental Services in Asia: Payments, Compensation, or Co-Investment? , 2010 .

[75]  R. Rice.  Agricultural intensification within agroforestry : The case of coffee and wood products , 2008 .

[76]  Martial Bernoux,et al.  Biodiversity, carbon stocks and sequestration potential in aboveground biomass in smallholder farming systems of western Kenya , 2009 .

[77]  Shannon J. Brines,et al.  A multi-scale assessment of hurricane impacts on agricultural landscapes based on land use and topographic features , 2008 .

[78]  I. Perfecto,et al.  Shade effect on coffee production at the northern Tzeltal zone of the state of Chiapas, Mexico , 2000 .

[79]  J. Neilson,et al.  Global Private Regulation and Value-Chain Restructuring in Indonesian Smallholder Coffee Systems , 2008 .

[80]  Russell Greenberg,et al.  Biodiversity Loss in Latin American Coffee Landscapes: Review of the Evidence on Ants, Birds, and Trees , 2008, Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology.

[81]  A. Jarvis,et al.  Predicted Impact of Climate Change on Coffee Supply Chains , 2011 .

[82]  U. Grote,et al.  The impact of coffee certification on small‐scale producers’ livelihoods: a case study from the Jimma Zone, Ethiopia , 2012 .