[[link removed]]

PORTSIDE CULTURE

CLIMATE CHANGE IS DEVASTATING COFFEE PRODUCTION WORLDWIDE. CAN IT
TAKE ROOT IN FLORIDA?  
[[link removed]]


 

Diana Kruzman
July 18, 2025
Ambrook Research
[[link removed]]


*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

_ When Florida growers last attempted to plant coffee in the 1940s it
“got frozen out,” unable to tolerate temperatures in the 40s and
50s.The number of freezing events per year has sharply decreased
opening the possibility of growing crops like coffee _

Florida’s changing climate could mean it’s time to give coffee in
the state another try., Graphic by Adam Dixon

 

If you’ve ever bought a bouquet of flowers, chances are the green
fronds placed among the blooms came from Pierson, Florida. This sleepy
town of 1,500, sprawled out along Highway 17 about halfway between
Jacksonville and Orlando, bills itself as the “Fern Capital of the
World,” and for good reason: The area around Pierson supplies 97
percent of the leatherleaf ferns in the U.S., the most popular variety
for floral arrangements.

Ferns in Pierson are typically grown outdoors to take advantage of
central Florida’s slightly acidic soil and warm, humid climate, but
they also require artificial shade structures or large trees to
protect them from the relentless sun. When Felipe Ferrão, a plant
researcher at the University of Florida, first came to Pierson in
2023, he immediately thought that these shaded areas would be ideal
for another kind of crop: coffee.

This year, Ferrão is planning on testing out this hypothesis by
brewing his first batch of coffee from field-grown Florida beans,
which he plans to harvest from a half-acre plot on a fern farm in
Pierson. He hopes to demonstrate that Florida can nurture a homegrown
coffee industry, providing a domestic supply of the crop at a time
when climate change is devastating coffee plots in countries like
Brazil and Kenya.

“We are the country that consumes the most coffee in the world,”
Ferrão said. “If we think about the fact that by 2050, more than 60
percent of coffee production around the globe is going to decline,
there is no way that this country won’t be affected.”

Florida is better known for its citrus industry, which once thrived in
the state’s abundant sunshine but has declined by over 90 percent
[[link removed]] in
the last two decades due to more extreme weather and the spread of
citrus greening disease. When Ferrão started working at the
University of Florida as a postdoc in 2017, his goal was to study how
genomics and plant breeding could be used to develop new kinds of
agricultural industries in the state, starting with blueberries.
Ferrão comes from a long line of coffee farmers in Brazil, the
world’s largest coffee producer
[[link removed]],
and he eventually began thinking about what it would take to grow the
crop in Florida.

To find funding and institutional support for the project, Ferrão
approached the University of Florida’s Tropical Research And
Education Center [[link removed]], where since
1929 specialists have studied how to grow all kinds of tropical
fruits, vegetables, and ornamental plants, from passionfruit and
papayas to lychees and limes. They breed different varieties to
develop ones that are most adapted to the climate and try to work out
solutions for diseases and pest control issues, said Jonathan Crane,
the center’s associate director.

“People have tried to grow coffee down here for many years and have
not been successful,” Crane said. “They didn’t have the
knowledge to grow it successfully, or they picked the wrong species or
variety of coffee.”

Temperatures played a role, too. Coffee originates from the Ethiopian
highlands and has been introduced to countries like Brazil, Vietnam,
Costa Rica, Kenya, and Colombia, all located close to the equator
between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, an area known as the
“coffee belt
[[link removed]].”
The climate here is mild and typically doesn’t swing into extremes,
which is how coffee plants like it. _Coffea arabica_, the most
popular variety, thrives in a temperature range between 64° and
70°F
[[link removed]].

Though Florida is usually warm and sunny, because it lies north of the
coffee belt it can occasionally experience freezing temperatures
(leading to headlines about iguanas falling out of trees
[[link removed]]).
When Florida growers last attempted to plant coffee in the 1940s,
Crane said, it “got frozen out,” unable to tolerate temperatures
in the 40s and 50s.

Florida’s changing climate, though, could mean it’s time to give
coffee in the state another try. Average annual temperatures in the
state have increased by 3.5° F
[[link removed]] since
1950. Although Florida still experiences winter cold snaps, the number
of freezing events per year has sharply decreased, Crane said,
allowing agricultural production to move northward. And it’s opening
up the possibility of growing some crops, like coffee, that struggled
to survive when temperatures were colder.

Ferrão is also experimenting with growing a different variety of
coffee — _Coffea canephora_, also known as robusta —
that’s more heat- and pest-resistant
[[link removed]] than
the popular arabica. And aside from producing homegrown coffee,
Ferrão’s research focuses on understanding the genetics of coffee
plants in order to breed more resilient, flavorful, and high-yielding
varieties — not just in Florida, but around the world.

“We can deliver new tools [to growers], discover new trends and
answer important biological questions,” Ferrão said. “All this
expertise can help breeders and other institutions to improve the
sustainability of the coffee chain.”

The work in Pierson began two years ago, when Ferrão was contacted by
Gineva Peterson, a Pierson resident whose family has been running a
fernery there since the 1970s and who wanted to branch out into
growing coffee but couldn’t afford the start-up costs. She offered
her land in exchange for Ferrão’s plants and expertise, and since
May of last year they’ve planted around
600 _arabica _and _robusta_ seedlings, which they anticipate will
produce enough beans to host a coffee tasting by the end of the year.

Peterson’s eventual goal is to run a coffee shop supplied entirely
by her home-grown beans. Though it would be a Florida first, coffee
production has also taken root in southern California, where a
cooperative of 65 small farmers called Frinj is growing on a
commercial scale
[[link removed]].
Crane sees potential for family farms and small growers to similarly
make a living selling specialty, “Florida coffee”-branded beans.

“It’s not like we’re going to become a major coffee production
area for the world like Brazil or Vietnam,” Crane said. Instead,
“there is a huge interest and potential for a niche, high-end,
valuable coffee industry.”

He brought up the example of Kona coffee, which was introduced to
Hawaii in 1829 and grows only on around 9,000 acres on the slopes of
the Hualalai and Mauna Loa mountains. One of the most expensive
coffees in the world, it averages around $20 per pound
[[link removed]] and
can get up to $60 or more
[[link removed]].
Educated consumers who have developed specific tastes in coffee, Crane
said, are willing to pay a premium for specialty brands; other income
can come from agrotourism, where people visit coffee farms and see how
it’s grown and roasted.

The coffee plants have had to adjust to Florida’s sandy soil, and
those grown under shade structures needed to be protected from
freezing. Eventually, Peterson hopes to transition away from shade
structures entirely and instead plant coffee underneath groves of oak
trees in an arrangement known as a “hammock
[[link removed]],” which
also naturally keeps them warm in the winter. Insurers have stopped
covering shade structures in the last few years, Peterson said,
claiming they were too vulnerable to destruction from hurricanes.

Though Peterson doesn’t see coffee replacing ferns entirely, she
believes the additional crop can help diversify the agricultural
industry in central Florida. She anticipates she’ll have enough
beans to open her coffee shop within one to two years. And once she
and the University of 

Florida researchers have finalized their coffee-growing technique,
other growers in Florida can participate, too.

“The majority of people in the U.S. have not seen a coffee tree,”
Peterson said. She thinks they’ll come to Florida “just to
experience what a coffee tree looks like.”

DIANA KRUZMAN

Diana Kruzman is a freelance journalist covering agriculture, climate
change, and the environment, in the U.S. and around the world. Her
work has appeared in National Geographic, Undark, Earther, and other
publications. She lives in New York City.

* coffee
[[link removed]]
* Climate Change
[[link removed]]
* agriculture
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web
[[link removed]]

Submit via email
Frequently asked questions
[[link removed]]
Manage subscription
[[link removed]]
Visit portside.org
[[link removed]]

Twitter [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 



########################################################################

[link removed]

To unsubscribe from the xxxxxx list, click the following link:
[link removed]