Carbon payment strategies in coffee agroforests shape climate and biodiversity outcomes

Agricultural supply chains increasingly mitigate climate change and biodiversity loss through initiatives that either plant trees or protect threatened carbon stocks on farmlands. We conducted a global meta-analysis to evaluate how these programs may impact carbon and biodiversity outcomes across coffee agriculture, which spans a vegetation complexity gradient from monoculture to biodiverse agroforestry. For aboveground carbon, we estimated coffee farms currently hold 481.59 TgC globally and could sequester an additional 81.53-86.50 TgC under different agroforestry adoption scenarios. However, more than twice as much aboveground carbon could be lost under intensification scenarios (174.23-221.45 TgC). While tree diversity supports overall biodiversity in agroforestry, we found it does not independently increase carbon, indicating carbon and biodiversity outcomes may be decoupled. Ultimately, tree planting programs in coffee can sequester meaningful carbon volumes but may fail to achieve global carbon and biodiversity goals if they do not also protect existing agroforestry and diversify planting efforts. Global coffee farms now store roughly 481.59 Tg carbon, with more carbon lost from removing existing shade trees than gained by planting new ones into coffee monocultures, which is largely independent of biodiversity outcomes, as revealed by a global meta-analysis.

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Publication Details

Journal
Communications Earth & Environment
Published
2025-08-19
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-025-02574-w
Citations
2
Primary Topic
Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
2.21

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article

Carbon payment strategies in coffee agroforests shape climate and biodiversity outcomes

Ruth E. Bennett, Jefferson S. Hall, Fernando Vieira Cesário, Damien Beillouin et al.
2 citations
Communications Earth & Environment
Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management
2.21
article

Carbon payment strategies in coffee agroforests shape climate and biodiversity outcomes

Ruth E. Bennett, Jefferson S. Hall, Fernando Vieira Cesário, Damien Beillouin, Vivian Griffey, Todd S. Rosenstock, Rémi Cardinael, Starry Sprenkle-Hyppolite, Peter Steward, Katherine Culbertson, Cyril Melikov, Susan C. Cook‐Patton, Emily Pappo, Alison Lovdal, Drew Terasaki Hart
article en
2 citations

Abstract

Agricultural supply chains increasingly mitigate climate change and biodiversity loss through initiatives that either plant trees or protect threatened carbon stocks on farmlands. We conducted a global meta-analysis to evaluate how these programs may impact carbon and biodiversity outcomes across coffee agriculture, which spans a vegetation complexity gradient from monoculture to biodiverse agroforestry. For aboveground carbon, we estimated coffee farms currently hold 481.59 TgC globally and could sequester an additional 81.53-86.50 TgC under different agroforestry adoption scenarios. However, more than twice as much aboveground carbon could be lost under intensification scenarios (174.23-221.45 TgC). While tree diversity supports overall biodiversity in agroforestry, we found it does not independently increase carbon, indicating carbon and biodiversity outcomes may be decoupled. Ultimately, tree planting programs in coffee can sequester meaningful carbon volumes but may fail to achieve global carbon and biodiversity goals if they do not also protect existing agroforestry and diversify planting efforts. Global coffee farms now store roughly 481.59 Tg carbon, with more carbon lost from removing existing shade trees than gained by planting new ones into coffee monocultures, which is largely independent of biodiversity outcomes, as revealed by a global meta-analysis.

Communications Earth & EnvironmentVol. 6(1)
The Nature Conservancy (US), Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (PA), Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (AU), Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (FR), Conservation International (US), University of Zimbabwe (ZW), Université de Montpellier (FR), Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute (US), National Zoological Park (US), International Center for Tropical Agriculture (KE), Nano Carbon (Poland) (PL), Conservation Biology Institute, Fonctionnement agroécologique et performances des systèmes de culture horticoles, University of California, Berkeley (US)
Knobloch Family Foundation
Climate action
Openalex Percentile: Top 12%
Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management
2.21
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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