Coffee: A Comprehensive Guide to the Bean, the Beverage, and the Industry - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1442214406 ISBN 13: 9781442214408

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2013

Synopsis

Coffee: A Comprehensive Guide to the Bean, the Beverage, and the Industry offers a definitive guide to the many rich dimensions of the bean and the beverage around the world. Leading experts from business and academia consider coffee's history, global spread, cultivation, preparation, marketing, and the environmental and social issues that surround it today. They discuss, for example, the impact of globalization; the many definitions of organic, direct trade, and fair trade; the health of female farmers; the relationship between shade, birds, and coffee; roasting as an art and a science; and where profits are made in the commodity chain. Drawing on interviews and the lives of people working in the business-from pickers and roasters to coffee bar owners and consumers-the book brings a compelling human side to the story. The authors avoid romanticizing or demonizing any group in the business. They consider basic but widely misunderstood issues such as who adds value to the bean, the constraints of peasant life, and the impact of climate change. Moving beyond simple answers, they represent various participants in the supply chain and a range of opinions about problems and suggested solutions in the industry. Coffee offers a multi-dimensional examination of a deceptively everyday but extremely complex commodity that remains at the center of many millions of lives. Tracing coffee's journey from field to cup, this handbook will be an essential guide for professionals, coffee lovers, and students alike to one of the world's favorite beverages.

About this title

About the Author

Robert W. Thurston is Phillip R. Shriver Professor in the Department of History at Miami University. Jonathan Morris is Research Professor of Modern European History at the University of Hertfordshire. Shawn Steiman is head of Coffea Consulting, Honolulu, Hawai'i.

Edition details

• Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1442214406
• ISBN 13: 9781442214408
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 424
• Editor: Robert W. Thurston, Jonathan Morris, Shawn Steiman