But what would happen if you could no longer afford a cup of Joe or if it was no longer available?

Coffee is, in many ways, a poster child of an industry facing a future crisis. Most coffee is grown from two different species — arabica and robusta — but there are 122 other wild species. Coffee’s already limited range of tropical growing region will likely dwindle, and 60% of wild coffee species face extinction. Millions of hectares of crops risk being lost in the space of a few decades and 25 million coffee growers risk losing their means of subsistence.

In many other types of crops, there are seed companies that drive breeding and care about conserving genetic diversity, but that doesn’t exist in the coffee industry. There is a disconnect between the numerous coffee roasters and the breeders who could turn crop diversity into new varieties able to, for example, withstand a drought or resist the latest pest outbreak.

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In California, over 100 million trees have died due to the drought.  In Tennessee the drought is posing a huge threat to the cattle industry.  Pastures have dried up and farmers have resorted to feeding the cattle hay which is normally saved for the winter months.  Similar stories are reported out of Georgia as well.

Wildfires have ravaged over 54,000 acres of forest, protected areas and farmland in parts of Peru.  Peru is experiencing the regions worst drought in at least half a century.  Wildfires have burned over 100,000 acres of land across seven southern U.S. states leading to mass evacuations.

As devastating as those issues are; other countries are faring much worse.  The severe drought in Madagascar has left 330,000 people on the brink of famine.

As Bolivia faces its worst drought in at least 25 years, the government has been forced to declare a state of emergency.  It is estimated that the drought has affected 125,000 families and threatened 716,605 acres of agricultural land and 360,000 head of cattle.