Poor Farmer

Public Radio International (PRI) November 10, 2011 In Uganda, the coffee trees are nearly empty and it's not because of the harvest. A combination of disease, lack of rain and rising temperatures are decimating coffee crops. A farmer near Uganda's Mount Elgon holds Arabica coffee berries. It's getting more difficult to grow coffee berries because of  erratic weather patterns.  (Photo by Jill Braden Balderas.) When you grow coffee, dead, brown leaves are not what you want to see. They've been a scourge recently for coffee farmer Ahmed Nsubuga. “It’s not good to show to your friends,” Nsubuga said with a laugh. Nsubuga manages to maintain his sense of humor, even as the coffee farm where he works in central Uganda has been hit hard by drought. Earlier this year, not a drop of rain fell for six months. Some of the coffee trees died. Others produced only a few red berries. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight … nine,” N...

By Julie Jargon The Wall Street Journal November 10, 2011 Starbucks   Corp. is branching out in a new direction with the acquisition of Evolution Fresh Inc., a premium juice brand carried in West Coast supermarkets. The Seattle-based coffee giant, which is expected to announce on Thursday that it just closed the $30 million all-cash deal, is trying to do with juice what it has done with coffee, by turning a commodity-like product into an experience. To do that, the company plans to open a separate retail concept centered around juice, as well as health foods, next year, a company spokesman says. The company has not yet decided how many juice bars there will be, where the first ones will open or whether they will carry the Starbucks logo. Starbucks earlier this year debuted a new logo featuring a larger siren figure without the words "Starbucks coffee," a sign of the company's ambitions to move beyond its signature coffee shops. Starbucks also is ...

By Isis Almeida Bloomberg November 10, 2011 Global coffee production in the season started last month will fall from a previous estimate as rainfall hurt crops in   Asia   and   Latin America , according to the   International Coffee Organization . World coffee production will be 127.4 million bags in the 2011-12 season started last month, down from a previous forecast of 129.5 million bags in September, the ICO said in a monthly report e-mailed today. A bag weighs 60 kilograms (132 pounds). “Adverse weather conditions, which could have a negative impact on production or post-harvest activities, have been recorded in a number of exporting countries, particularly in Central America and Indonesia,” the ICO said. Production in Guatemala, Central America’s second-largest producer, will fall 8.9 percent to 3.6 million bags as rains hurt the crop, while output in El Salvador will tumble more than 21 percent to 1.45 million bags, the London-based gro...