If you’re a coffee connoisseur—for those that are not, the world is less joyful—your coffee should have a bitter chocolate note. It should have nutty flavours, maybe roasted almonds. If you’re more of a rasigar, you want fruit notes. Still more sophistication, you have honey and flower notes. You’re now, coffee-wise, in Ethiopia, the place of its origin, where citrus, lime and orange notes rule.

As a third-generation coffee grower and planter of more than 75 acres, Dr Pradeep Kenjige knows it. He is the director of Coffee Day Group with a doctorate in Plant and Environmental Sciences from Kuvempu University. For his MS, he did his research in the US’ Arizona desert on how elevated carbon levels are affecting cotton. Increased starch and cellulose material in the leaf encouraged insects to devour more leaves and increased their numbers, too. For his PhD, he focused on how pesticides are leaching into the Western Ghat’s ecosystems and their impact on the environment.

His recommendation of biodegradable, eco-friendly wrapping around coffee plants was accepted by the Coffee Board and it was in practice for six to seven years. As a director of Café Coffee Day, he works on different methods of roasting, how to bring out the best sub-profile in coffee, creating new blends, in addition to a bit of marketing around it.

Asked how climate change is affecting coffee, Kenjige says, “all of us, including me, talk not with data but just by experience.” In the midst of multiple cultivation practices and new varieties being introduced, it’s difficult to tease out climate change effects.

For instance, the temperature in Chikmagalur has dropped to 9C, which he has never seen. Usually, it hovers at 12-13C. In 25 years of plantation work, this is the first time he felt that cold. Additionally, there used to be too much dew whenever there was cold, but this year there is no dew.

He says something unusual happened last year. The heat was unbearable from March 15 to April 15.  There was water scarcity everywhere. Irrigation too was not up to levels necessary. Rains were scant. He expected “a really poor crop on Robusta”. But to his surprise it was a bumper year. Arabica fared poorly for everyone in the same conditions. Arabica and Robusta are the two main varieties of coffee beans.

The difference could be, he says, that quite a few of them did sprinkler irrigation for Robusta and none for Arabica. The area’s average is 650-750 kg per acre for Robusta. Last year it was between 900-1,000 kg.

“Was the bumper crop for Robusta due to irrigation or any other thing?” Nobody is clear on this.

What determines the crop is flowering. It happens on one day of the year, usually March. As to what brings out the best crop, Kenjige says, it’s stress.

“Plants should suffer.”

Plants should suffer in the month of December, pine for water or suffer harsh temperatures. Low temperatures bring in the best, around 11-12C night temperatures. Plants yield better when they get a shock.

“If they feel they’re going to die, they yield more. Just for propagating their genes,” he says.

The process is common in all plants, especially the annuals and perennials. When conditions are too harsh, they yield more and die away. “It's the same for coffee also.”

Coffee needs ideal temperatures. With projections of three or four degrees or more in the business-as-usual scenario of pumping more CO2 into the atmosphere, the future for coffee is bad, especially Arabica.

Kenjige says the existing genotypes of Arabica cannot sustain that increased temperature. This is where long-term studies are very important to nail down how precisely warming is affecting coffee. It’s not just temperature. It’s rainfall, irrigation, water systems. It’s how these things affect insects.

It’s common knowledge among Chikamagalur coffee planters that “a prolonged rainfall will control white stem borer.” So, when the rains fail, as they did in 2011-12, the coffee crop was wiped out by white stem borer in the three major districts of Chikmagalur, and part of Hassan.

India exports around 70 per cent of its production, and it’s likely to increase. Farming practices have changed with mechanisation, sprinkler irrigation, use of chemicals and fertilisers. Yields per acre have shot up by as much as 60-70 per cent. Small farmers, too, have adopted irrigation to produce more.

In the midst of burgeoning coffee production in India, it’s difficult to evaluate whether climate change has any effect on yields.

Kenjige says even if there is a drop in the yield due to climate change, it will be negated by chemically-driven farming practices. While India needs more studies on how warming is affecting coffee and how it’s being compensated by new farming practices, evidence from different parts of the world is troublesome. The largest coffee producers, Brazil and Vietnam, have been hit with warming-driven impacts.

In Brazil, frost in 2021 followed by drought in 2023 decimated the Arabica crop. In some regions, branches of plants had not grown sufficiently due to drought, which reduced the yield of beans.

In Vietnam, it was relentless rains in 2024 that affected bean quality. Moreover, hot humid environments are a breeding ground for pests and disease. Coffee leaf rust destroyed crops in many places, a result of the changed climate.

Everywhere, including India, warming is bringing down plant productivity, encouraging more disease outbreaks, more leaf fall. Extreme cold, as now in Chikmagalur, can affect flowering and quality of berries. Unseasonal rains can also affect berries in negative ways.

India’s coffee production stands at 3.6 lakh tonnes of Arabica and Robusta, covering an estimated 4.05 lakh hectares. Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala account for 96 per cent of the production, with Karnataka on top with 2.80 lakh tonnes. As per this note, India’s coffee exports fetched $1.8 billion in 2024-25.

The Coffee Board aims to ramp up production to more than seven lakh tonnes by 2047. But with extreme weather events increasing—both temperature and rainfall—and the experiences of top producers like Brazil and Vietnam, that might remain an unrealised wish, although things are rosy now.

But, hey, how about that cuppa now?