Eat This Podcast
Talking about anything around food
Subscribe
Collections
Donate
Archive

Coffee leaf rust is bad news An up-close look at the half-smooth destroyer

5 October 2020

Coffee leaf rust inside a leaf

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 28:28 — 26.1MB)

Subscribe: Google Podcasts | Spotify | Android | RSS | More

Stuart McCook
Stuart McCook
When I think of Ceylon — Sri Lanka — I think of tea, but that’s because I wasn’t alive 150 years ago. In the 1860s, coffee was the island’s most important crop. Coffee leaf rust, a fungus, put paid to the coffee, but only after a global downturn in coffee prices, and planters switched to tea. The rust, however, is not the reason the Brits drink tea rather than coffee, just one of the things I learned from Stuart McCook, who has studied the history of coffee leaf rust and what it might hold for the future.

Notes

  1. Stuart McCook’s book is Coffee Is Not Forever: A Global History of the Coffee Leaf Rust.
  2. The disease is no stranger to news media. Coffee Rust Is Going to Ruin Your Morning is a recent example that actually says nothing about your morning joe — but does blame rust for Britain’s preference for tea.
  3. There is a transcript, thanks to the show’s supporters.
  4. Banner photo shows coffee leaf rust inside a leaf, used under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Australia License

huffduffer icon   Huffduff it

Filed under:
Podcasts
See also:

13 thoughts on Coffee leaf rust is bad news An up-close look at the half-smooth destroyer

  • AgroBioDiverse commented 5 years ago.

    Thanks to both of you for a great discussion.



    Reply
  • Stuart McCook commented 5 years ago.

    Attention coffee lovers. We have a transcript of @stuartmccook on coffee leaf rust, in the Notes at eatthispodcast.com/coffee-rust/ https://t.co/rjV

    Reply
  • Jorge C. Berny Mier y Teran commented 5 years ago.

    In the latest episode @stuartmccook tells me about #coffee leaf rust

    eatthispodcast.com/coffee-rust/

    Reply
  • AgroBioDiverse mentioned this post 5 years ago.

    So why *did* the Brits switch to tea if it wasn’t because of coffee leaf rust in Ceylon?

    twitter.com/eatpodcast/sta…

    Reply
  • AgroBioDiverse commented 5 years ago.

    Attention coffee lovers. We have a transcript of @stuartmccook on coffee leaf rust, in the Notes at eatthispodcast.com/coffee-rust/ https://t.co/rjV

    Reply
  • Philip Magowan commented 5 years ago.

    In the latest episode @stuartmccook tells me about #coffee leaf rust

    eatthispodcast.com/coffee-rust/

    Reply
  • Jonathan Morris mentioned this post 5 years ago.

    Can’t wait to listen to this.

    Reply
  • Stuart McCook mentioned this post 5 years ago.

    A delightful conversation with Jeremy Cherfas about the coffee leaf rust. Among other things, remember this: the coffee leaf rust epidemic in Ceylon did NOT cause the British people to switch from drinking coffee to drinking tea. @OhioUnivPress

    Reply
  • Stuart McCook mentioned this post 5 years ago.

    A delightful conversation with Jeremy Cherfas about the coffee leaf rust. Among other things, remember this: the coffee leaf rust epidemic in Ceylon did NOT cause the British people to switch from drinking coffee to drinking tea. @OhioUnivPress

    Reply
  • Stuart McCook commented 5 years ago.

    In the latest episode @stuartmccook tells me about #coffee leaf rust

    eatthispodcast.com/coffee-rust/

    Reply

    • Leave a Reply

    Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

    Webmentions

    webmention logo Webmentions allow you to respond on your own site and have that appear here. Your response should include a link to this post. Paste the URL to your post below and your comment will appear here. (Learn More.)

You might also like:

  1. Cow sharing in the European Alps A new twist on community supported agricultureUnlike car sharing, when you buy a share in a cow, you are not free to drive her wherever you want. So what do you get?...
  2. Where did the chicken cross the road? The domestication of livestock, as revealed by DNAThe DNA of chickens, sheep and cattle tells slightly different stories about their domestication...
  3. From little seeds … How one country is sharing its edible historyA second visit to Scariff in County Clare, Ireland, to hear from the people working hard to save Ireland's vegetable heritage and make seeds available to a new generation of gardeners....
  4. Long live the Carolina African Runner Who cares whether it really is the “ur-peanut” of the American SouthIs the Carolina Runner No.4 peanut "the first peanut cultivated in North America" and does it matter anyway? ...
email log Instagram logo mastodon logo Micro Blog logo Email logo

Search

About Eat This Podcast

Eat This Podcast has been going since March 2013. That’s a long time in podcast world. In that time, it has twice been nominated for a James Beard Award, although it remains a labour of love rather than a search for glory.

I am a biologist with a keen interest in food and agriculture. Eat This Podcast allows me to pursue my interests and share what I find.

I owe an immense debt of gratitude to all the guests who agree to be on the show, to the professional broadcasters who trained me, and to the software that allows me to do all this myself.

Subscribe here to get an email for each new episode. Between episodes, Eat This Newsletter brings you a selection of choice items I’ve found.

You will need to confirm your subscription, so look out for that and, maybe, check your spam folder.

Non-podcast News

Help Keep the Lights On

Ratings and reviews are great. So is an actual donation.

Elsewhere

There are other places I write and respond.

Our Daily Bread

Our Daily Bread was a series of micro-episodes on the history of wheat and bread, with an episode every day through the month of August 2018.

Posts are in correct chronological order, so you need to scroll to the bottom to find the latest.