Coffee Could Be Extinct by 2080: Coffee lovers everywhere be warned: a warming planet could make 99.7 percent of bean-growing regions too hot to support the crop. A new study from Kew Gardens looked at what might happen to
Coffee Could Be Extinct by 2080: Coffee lovers everywhere be warned: a warming planet could make 99.7 percent of bean-growing regions too hot to support the crop. A new study from Kew Gardens looked at what might happen to Arabic beans — responsible for 70 percent of the world’s coffee market — in three different climate change scenarios. Each scenarios found that the regions would become too warm to support the fertile grounds were wild Arabica beans grow. Although much of the commercial coffee we drink comes from greenhouses, the wild strain is vital to the bean’s longevity. These “pure” beans show farmers what it takes to resist pests and disease and are used to make the farmed beans more resilient.