A new report from international nonprofit TechnoServe and the United Nations Industrial Development Organization’s (UNIDO) ACT Coffee Programme says 10 of the world’s leading coffee-producing countries face growing exposure to climate stress, yet their capacity to adapt varies greatly.
The report calls for data-driven strategic investments to better protect the global coffee sector — and the farmers who power it — from widespread climate stress. To support that call, the report provides deeply researched benchmarks on three dimensions: climate risk exposure, climate sensitivity and adaptive capacity.
Published June 4, the report, “Benchmarking Coffee Production and Climate Risk,” draws on existing climate data, global risk indexes and TechnoServe field program data to score the 10 countries. The analysis was conducted under what was described as a middle-of-the-road climate change scenario and modeled across two time horizons: near-term (2020-2040) and long-term (2040-2060).
The report outlines how farmers may have vastly different coping capacities and support systems from one country to the next — a reality that could inform investment decisions.
For example, Brazil, Peru and Indonesia were identified as having higher overall climate-risk vulnerability while also scoring higher on adaptive capacity. Vietnam also scored high on adaptive capacity, though the report placed it in an intermediate vulnerability category. East African countries such as Ethiopia and Uganda showed lower overall vulnerability but weaker adaptive capacity, with smaller farm sizes, lower yields and fewer support systems making adaptation more difficult.
In general, the report found that East African coffee-producing countries, though less exposed to the worst climate projections, often have more fragile farm economics. Smallholder revenue in Uganda was estimated at $610 per hectare, compared to $4,885 in Vietnam and $4,731 in Brazil.
One of the report’s central arguments is that making coffee farming more profitable is itself one of the most powerful buffers against climate risk.
“The report reflects what TechnoServe teams around the world see every day,” Paul Stewart, TechnoServe’s global coffee director and one of the report’s lead authors, said in an announcement of the publication. “Climate change is already affecting the productivity and livelihoods of smallholder coffee farmers, yet many lack the tools they need to respond.”
The new report builds directly on TechnoServe’s 2025 Regenerative Coffee Investment Case, which estimated that an investment of roughly $560 million per year over seven years in regenerative agriculture could generate $2.1 billion in additional farm income and $2.6 billion in additional exports per year across several key countries.
TechnoServe said the findings of the new report have been supported by 13 coffee companies, saying that “across the industry, there is growing alignment around the need to act.” The report itself was prepared by TechnoServe with funding from UNIDO’s ACT Coffee Programme, which is funded by the Italian Cooperation.
The report and announcement do not indicate that the coffee companies financially supported the report, nor do they detail what investments those companies have made in farmer-focused climate adaptation, if any.
The call for coordinated investment arrives at a difficult moment for global agricultural development. The Trump administration’s dismantling of USAID and broader foreign-aid cuts have left a significant funding gap in the coffee sector.
TechnoServe and UNIDO are hosting a June 16 webinar to share insights from the report.
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Nick Brown
Nick Brown is the editor of Daily Coffee News by Roast Magazine.
