PSA. We’ve got a problem. We all love Coffee and there is so many great local roasters and cafes around Perth these days we all get to support and enjoy. But the way things are going soon enough we may be a lot harder to get a tasty brew and we are genuinely concerned. If our demand for coffee continues as it has at around 1.9-2%pa then (even without taking to account the effect of climate change) we will have a shortage of around 60 million bags by 2050 – 180 million if we take into account existing trends in climate. Feeling somewhat like a helpless spectator we asked Rick Reinheat, CEO of the Specialty Coffee Association what he thinks we can do, as a small batch roaster in Perth participating in this industry if only at the micro level. Part of his advice was to make sure we pay good money for our coffee. Buying responsibly to ensure farmers have improving value over their production. Together with investment in science & agriculture to improve existing farming practices, such as developing new temperature / disease resistant coffee varietals that taste amazing. This month we reserved two of our customers favourite single origin coffees, blended them 50/50 to make a limited edition blend. We called this “Black Gold” because we couldn’t really think of anything else at the time and distributed it across our wholesale customers over two weeks. We plan to do this every few months with all money received from its sale to be donated to World Coffee Research @wcoffeeresearch An organisation made up of coffee professionals dedicated to problems like these so that future generations can enjoy Coffee too.