Coffee Crisis: Why are Prices Breaking Records?

May 30, 2025·42 min·3 clips

Coffee prices have shattered a 47-year record, reaching $4 a pound for the first time ever.

Coffee prices have become hard to ignore. The programme starts with the daily cup, then follows international prices as they break record after record. The word crisis is used, and the reasons are plain enough: crop failure, poor harvests, low stocks, and prices moving fast. The fallout is uneven. Farmers in Brazil and Vietnam may see higher prices while having less coffee to sell after weak crops. Colombia is in a different spot. With a normal crop and ultra high prices, Colombian farmers are described as making good money from the spike. Speculators are part of the story too. Some send trained people onto farms in Brazil and Vietnam to count beans and work out national production before the rest of the market catches up. It sounds like spies, but the guest says the bean counting is legal, agreed with farmers, and useful enough to affect trades. Then the episode pulls back. Coffee looks vulnerable after a century of narrowing supply and pushing aside a lot of diversity. Diversity, here, means a better chance of coping. Odd coffees show up, including fruits like small pears, brain-like beans, and species built for water dispersal. Erin Davis is named. With producers in South Sudan, Uganda, and India, his work points toward more excelsa reaching cups this year. The ending is wary but hopeful: drinkers may pay a few more pence per cup, and the hope is that more of that money reaches farmers.

Listen to the show on

Apple Podcasts Spotify

Play clips from this episode More from The Food Programme