WHAT ARE THE ISSUES?

For consumers the price of coffee has been steadily declining over the last decade, however the cost of production has been increasing over time, resulting in smaller profit margins and even losses for farmers. This then creates lower wages and unethical practises, such as using child labour, and paying employees for the amount of cherries they pick in a day, which causes income inequality between young and older workers despite working for the same amount of hours (Difference Coffee Company, n.d.).

The environmental issues surrounding the coffee industry doesn't just refer to excess packaging and waste and whether packaging can be recycled, but also from impacts of some farming practises. Monoculture farming can have a negative impact on local biodiversity, affecting both wildlife and contributing to soil depletion (Difference Coffee Company, n.d.). Packaging is another main issue, single use takeaway cups are still widely used in comparison to reusable coffee cups. A lot of at home coffee packaging is also difficult to recycle through traditional kerbside collection methods, such as coffee machine pods (Cockburn, 2021).

WHAT'S BEING DONE

More products are being created to help consumers reduce waste and take active steps to make a positive impact. One company is KeepCup, started in Melbourne, Australia in 2007, KeepCup creates reusable coffee cups designed to last and be taken to coffee shops. Some coffee shops now reduce the price of their coffee when using reusable coffee cups. KeepCup also partner with many sustainability and circular economy efforts (KeepCup, n.d.).

Even larger high-street coffee chains are making an effort to improve sustainability - Costa Coffee was one of the first businesses to sign up to WRAP's 'Step Up to the Plate' pledge, which aims to half UK food waste by 2030. (Catriona, 2021).

Uptake in efforts to recycle coffee pods from consumer's home has also increased, Podback, created by Nespresso, NESCAFE Dolce Gusto and Tasimmo are the UK's first coffee pod recycling scheme, that offers both drop off and kerbside collection in some areas. It's the first scheme of its kind in the UK and is a big step forward for sustainablity in the industry (Podback, n.d.).

Nespresso AAA Sustainable Quality Program, partenerd with PUR Project aims to plant trees to help farmers, they reduce run off, stabalise soil and help protect coffee plants from adverse weather. This acts differently to other offsets as it directly helps coffee farmers rather than just purchasing offsets for company related emissions (Catriona, 2021).

REFERENCES

Cockburn, H. (2021). Almost 30,000 coffee pods go to landfill each month and take 500 years to decompose. [online] The Independent
Catriona (2021). Coffee Sustainability in Action. [online] British Coffee Association.
KeepCup (n.d.). Our Story | KeepCup. [online] Keepcup United Kingdom.
Podback (n.d.). Podback. [online] Podback