Monday, January 12, 2009

Shade Grown Coffee

I don't think coffee is an acceptable substance for a good diet but there are many passionate people that would argue with me. Coffee has some good points, but for me they don't come near overcoming the down side. With all the coffee that is consumed, my passion is for coffee drinkers to buy and drink shade-grown coffee. It's healthier since it requires less chemicals and it saves bird habitat in countries where our songbirds go for winter.

Shade-grown coffee is much easier on the environment than sunny coffee plantations. They require less fertilizer, prevent soil erosion, require fewer or zero pesticides, the list goes on.

From NPR's Science Friday:

Shade-grown coffee is sometimes called "bird friendly coffee," but a new paper in the journal Current Biology suggests that the plantations also help maintain the genetic diversity of native tree species.

NPR's Science Friday has a cool podcast about how shade-grown coffee farms also help with biodiversity of the areas, with a higher number of native tree species flourishing. Be sure to check out the video when you read the entire article.

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