Coffee

Coffee consumption is inversely associated with cognitive decline in elderly European men: the FINE Study

by Brian Buijsse

Between "Wild Tropics" and "Civilization": Guatemalan Coffee Plantations as Seen by German Immigrants. Paper presented at the workshop: Comparing Apples, Oranges, and Cotton: Environmental Histories of the Plantation. Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society, Munich 2011

by Christiane Berth

The Caffeine and Java Myth: The Relationship Between the World of Coffee to the Science of Diabetes and Obesity in Public Health

by Roy Chan

Key words: public health, medicine, coffee, diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure, caffine

In this new... more Key words: public health, medicine, coffee, diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure, caffine

In this new century, a cup of coffee can hold many things – the long morning hours driving to the office to the long nights studying and cramming for exams in the library. Coffee, in our context today, has become extremely popular where now more than 65 countries across the world grows coffee and is currently the second most traded commodities in the world, first being oil. Steven Topik, currently Professor of History at the University of California Irvine, once state that coffee provides “a case study for the development of the world economy for the last 500 years” (Topik, 2009). Although coffee will continue to rise the global marketplace, to what extent are the public health and medical problems assicuated with drinking too much coffee and what are its risk factors.

This short paper possible solution that could help prevent individuals from acquiring diabetes, obesity, or inhibiting high blood pressure as a result from caffeinated drinks. Until there are more accurate studies that prove the relationship between coffee and diabetes, various prevention techniques, intervention programs and new methods for selling, trading and producing coffee will remain ineffective. Risk factors, such as diabetes, obesity, stroke, heart disease, and high blood pressure in relation to caffeinated drinks must be addressed in higher priority at both local schools and at the community level in order to prevent early diabetes and/or obesity.

Sourcing strategies in the Italian coffee industry

by Matteo Borzoni

published in "Food Chain", 2011, vol 1(1), pp. 71-86

While the socio-economics of the coffee industry has received much attention, this article presents a novel analysis... more While the socio-economics of the coffee industry has received much attention, this article presents a novel analysis of B2B relationships in order to understand what determines coffee roasters' sourcing strategies. The theoretical framework is based on new institutional economics and relational contracting. The methodology is qualitative and uses a multiple-case approach. The evidence shows that different modes of transactions are devised in order to cope with the business uncertainty and to guarantee supplies of the coffee with the desired quality attributes. Traders offer to roasters guarantees that growers and exporters cannot provide. Relational components in transactions are essential to reduce uncertainty and transaction costs, and are important coordination mechanisms in trader-roaster linkages and even more so in the exporter-roaster interface. Roasters devise stronger coordination mechanisms with suppliers when the quality reputation of the core product is critical in their business strategy.

Aus Hamburg in die Kaffee-Welten Zentralamerikas : Die Nottebohm Hermanos in Guatemala. In: Mücke, Ulrich (Hrsg.) ; Arfs, Jörn (Hrsg.): Händler, Pioniere, Wissenschaftler. Hamburger in Lateinamerika.. Münster : LIT Verlag, 2010, S. 67-88.

by Christiane Berth

“Turkish Delight: The Eighteenth-Century Market in Turqueries and the Commercialization of Identity in France,”

by Julia Landweber

Published in The Proceedings of the Western Society for French History, vol. 30, 2004: 202-211.

      In the eighteenth century French images of the Turk, consumed as material turqueries, became... more       In the eighteenth century French images of the Turk, consumed as material turqueries, became important tools in shaping individual identities in France and, more broadly, in crafting a general vision of the French national character. Though often based on stereotype, turqueries allowed the consumer classes to reflect on who they were, by reference to who they were not. Beginning in the 1720s, and continuing well into the 1780s, turquerie invaded the French home and daily life. Designers and taste-makers incorporated Turkish elements into household objects, comestibles, interior and exterior décor, gardens, and fashionable clothing. Although much of this invasion occurred within the exclusive province of the wealthy, turquerie also reached beyond the rich to touch lower social strata, especially via the growing accessibility of coffee and through the adaptation of Turkish masquerade fashions into regular clothing. Turkish motifs became a defining element of mid-century French rococo, whether in architecture, art, literature, or dress. And coffee became a national drink in France in the same period, without losing any of its exotic flavor.
      By broadly interpreting the concept of mascarade à la turque to include not just literal masquerade balls, but also portrait paintings déguisé en turc and the proliferation of Turkish elements in dress, literature, decorative arts, and garden design, I argue that a willingness to play around with the outrageous idea of possessing a Turkish identity was intrinsic to the French becoming educated about their own nationality. Temporary assumption of a Turkish costume heightened individuals’ awareness that they could also craft their real personal identities through reference to this alien culture, which from the French perspective mixed attractive and awful qualities in nearly equal measure. By allowing the French to play seriously with seemingly frivolous rococo visions of Turkish identity, the cosmopolitan openness of the Enlightenment brought both the appealing and unappealing characteristics of their own identity into sharper relief, and ultimately helped to encourage the development of critical nationalist sentiments in France on the eve of the French Revolution.

“Domesticating the ‘Queen of Beans’: How Old Regime France Learned to Love Coffee”

by Julia Landweber

Published in The World History Bulletin, 26 (1) Spring 2010: 10-12.

H-France Review Vol9 No124 Landweber on Ina McCabe "Orientalism in Early Modern France"

by Julia Landweber

The Emergence of a Standards Market: Multiplicity of Sustainability Standards in the Global Coffee Industry

by Stephan Manning

Full Source: Reinecke, J.; Manning, S.; Von Hagen, O. 2012. "The Emergence of a Standards Market: Multiplicity of Sustainability Standards in the Global Coffee Industry", Organization Studies, Forthcoming.

The growing number of voluntary standards for governing transnational arenas is presenting standards organizations... more The growing number of voluntary standards for governing transnational arenas is presenting standards organizations with a problem. While claiming that they are pursuing shared, overarching objectives, at the same time, they are promoting their own respective standards that are increasingly similar. By developing the notion of ‘standards markets,’ this paper examines this tension and studies how different social movement and industry-driven standards organizations compete as well as collaborate over governance in transnational arenas. Based on an in-depth case study of sustainability standards in the global coffee industry, we find that the ongoing co-existence of multiple standards is being promoted by the interplay between two countervailing mechanisms: convergence and differentiation. In conjunction, these mechanisms are enabling the emergence and persistence of a market for standards through what we describe as meta-standardization of sustainable practices. Meta-standardization leads to convergence at the ‘rules of the game’ level, but allows also differentiation at the attributes level, which is enabling parties to create and maintain their own standards. Our study helps to advance the understanding of transnational governance by explaining the dynamics of competing and collaborating non-state actors in constituting a standards market.

The Economic, Social, and Environmental Consequences of Fair Trade Coffee

by Andrew Ofstehage

Senior Thesis, South Dakota State University

Global Rust Belt: Hemileia Vastatrix and the Ecological Integration of World Coffee Production Since 1850

by Stuart McCook

McCook, Stuart. 2006. “Global rust belt: Hemileia vastatrix and the ecological integration of world coffee production since 1850.” Journal of Global History 1 (02): 177-195.

The quantitative growth of coffee production and consumption in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries produced... more The quantitative growth of coffee production and consumption in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries produced qualitative transformations along every step of the coffee commodity chain. The economic integration of the global coffee market in this period triggered major east–west biological exchanges between the world’s coffee regions. The global epidemic of coffee leaf rust, caused by the fungus Hemileia vastatrix, illustrates the ecological and economic impact of such exchanges. Between 1865 and 1985, the epidemic spread from its original focus in Ceylon to engulf all of the world’s coffee zones. Its economic impact varied considerably: in some places it destroyed more than 90% of the coffee crop, while in others it was little more than a minor irritant. The epidemic’s origins, its diffusion, and its impacts were not accidental, but reflected specific conjunctures of local and global biological and historical processes.

Book Review: Changing Forests: Collective Action, Common Property and Coffee in Honduras

by Prakash Kashwan

The Ottoman Coffeehouse: All the Charms and Dangers of Commonality in the 16th-17th Century

by Gwendolyn Collaco

Lights: The MESSA Quarterly 1, no. 1 (Fall 2011)

La roya del café en Costa Rica: epidemias, innovación, y medio ambiente, 1950-1995

by Stuart McCook

McCook, Stuart. 2009. “La roya del café en Costa Rica: epidemias, innovación, y ambiente, 1980-1995. [Coffee rust in Central America: Epidemics, Innovation, and Envrionment, 1980-1995].” Revista de Historia [Costa Rica] (59-60): 99-117.

The history of tropical crops in the second half of the twentieth century is, in large part, a history of innovation.... more The history of tropical crops in the second half of the twentieth century is, in large part, a history of innovation. An analysis of this history of innovation allows us to glimpse the environmental history of these crops. Much of the innovation in this period was done to counter an unprecedented wave of crop diseases and pests. Recovering the history of these diseases, in turn, allows us to understand the increasingly fragile ecology of the main crops in Central America. This article analyzes these themes through a history of the coffee rust − Hemileia vastatrix− in Central America, with particular emphasis on Costa Rica.

Crônica De Uma Praga Anunciada Epidemias Agrícolas E História Ambiental Do Café Nas Américas

by Stuart McCook

McCook, Stuart. 2008. “Crônica de uma praga anunciada: epidemias agrícolas e história ambiental do café nas Américas.” Varia Historia 24 (39) (January): 87-111.

Crop epidemics provide a portal into the global and transnational environmental history of commodities. The coffee... more Crop epidemics provide a portal into the global and transnational environmental history of commodities. The coffee rust epidemic, caused by the fungus Hemileia vastatrix, is one of the most serious diseases to have afflicted the global coffee industry. In the nineteenth century, it devastated the coffee plantations in the Old World. It sharply curtailed arabica coffee production in Africa, Asia, and the Pacific. This was one of the factors that allowed the Americas do dominate global coffee production in the twentieth century. The coffee rust epidemic was first detected in the Americas in the 1970s. The history of the rust epidemic in the Americas, and attempts to control it, shed light on two major paradigms that shaped the environmental history of coffee in the late twentieth century. The paradigm of technification, which dominated from the mid-20th century to the early 1990s; and the paradigm of sustainability, which dominated emerged in the mid-1980s and continues to the present.

National Contexts Matter: The Co-evolution of Sustainability Standards in Global Value Chains

by Stephan Manning

Full Source: Manning, S.; Boons, F.; Von Hagen, O.; Reinecke, J. 2011. "National Contexts Matter: The Co-evolution of Sustainability Standards in Global Value Chains", Ecological Economics, Forthcoming.

In this paper, we investigate the role of key industry and other stakeholders and their embeddedness in particular... more In this paper, we investigate the role of key industry and other stakeholders and their embeddedness in particular national contexts in driving the proliferation and co-evolution of sustainability standards, based on the case of the global coffee industry. We find that institutional conditions and market opportunity structures in consuming countries have been important sources of standards variation, for example in the cases of Fairtrade, UTZ Certified and the Common Code for the Coffee Community (4C). In turn, supplier structures in producing countries as well as their linkages with traders and buyers targeting particular consuming countries have been key mechanisms of standards transmission and selection. Unlike prior research, which has emphasized the role of global actors and structures in promoting – and hindering – sustainability initiatives, we argue that national economic and institutional conditions in consuming and producing countries have not only served as important drivers of standardsmultiplicity and co-evolution, but also as catalysts for the entire global sustainability movement.

Fairtrade or fifty-fifty? The consequences of shifts in African perceptions of Fairtrade for development education practitioners

by Jonathan Penson

In: Policy and Practice: A Development Education Review, Issue 5, pp. 20-30. Centre for Global Education: Belfast. (2007)

Jonathan Penson examines the prized reputation Fairtrade has established among consumers for ethical trading, and... more Jonathan Penson examines the prized reputation Fairtrade has established among consumers for ethical trading, and finds that there is evidence that problems with Fairtrade institutions are encouraging some African coffee producers to exit the Fairtrade system, and that alternatives to Fairtrade are arising. Given that Fairtrade is so often and so successfully used as a synecdoche by development education practitioners for wider issues of advocacy around trade justice, this finding may have important repercussions for them.

Coffee, Fairtrade & Rwanda

by Jonathan Penson

Co-authored with Sara Edstrom and Annie Chamberland

‘Coffee, Fairtrade and Rwanda’ explains how the world coffee system works and how Fairtrade fits in. It looks at how... more ‘Coffee, Fairtrade and Rwanda’ explains how the world coffee system works and how Fairtrade fits in. It looks at how coffee is produced and how the world coffee trading system affects coffee producers. Written by volunteers working in Rwanda with Voluntary Service Overseas, it is aimed to be a complete resource for self-briefing for those interested in global education.

Fairtrade or fifty-fifty: Are African coffee producers forsaking Fairtrade?

by Jonathan Penson

Fairtrade has established a prized reputation among consumers for ethical trading. This article offers evidence that... more Fairtrade has established a prized reputation among consumers for ethical trading. This article offers evidence that problems with Fairtrade institutions are encouraging some African coffee producers to exit the Fairtrade system, and that indigenous alternatives to Fairtrade are arising. Expanding an existing model of the impact of enhanced pricing initiatives on local markets to make a comparative analysis of Fairtrade co-operatives in Rwanda with an alternative form of market-led ethical trading initiative in Uganda, it is found that second order regulation of the market is necessary to institutionalise the developmental gains offered by both forms.

Nommer et contrôler: les appellations de café en Ethiopie

by Cindy Adolphe

co-authored with Valérie Boisvert