Drought and pest attacks! Vietnamese coffee production may be further reduced

Recently, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) warned that extreme weather is frequent and climate change is hitting Asia hard.

At present, torrential rains, strong winds, floods and other extreme weather have occurred in some Asian countries, such as China, Dubai and other cities, which have been seriously affected. In South Asia, however, there are high temperatures in many countries, such as Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Indonesia, with the highest temperatures exceeding 45 ℃ in many regions.

According to the World Meteorological Organization, Asia is the worst-hit region in the world, with floods and storms causing the highest casualties and economic losses, while high temperatures are more severe, especially on agricultural crops such as coffee.

In the Robusta coffee producing area of Vietnam, it has been in a state of high temperature recently, and the high temperature has also led to the drought in the region. Therefore, coffee trees in the fruiting period need to significantly increase the use of irrigation water, but the current water resources are insufficient.

Due to drought and soaring temperatures, the riverbeds of several reservoirs have obviously dried up and cracked, and hundreds of thousands of fish have died in the reservoirs. Five provinces in Vietnam, including Quangji, Quang Ngai, Binh Shun, Fu'an and Calais, have issued secondary drought warnings.

According to local farmers, coffee trees are usually irrigated five times in the normal season, but in the current quarter, many farmers have irrigated coffee trees seven times and think they need irrigation for the eighth time, but there is not enough water to do so.

Wells and groundwater used for irrigation are drying up, leading to nutritional imbalances in trees under severe water shortages and extreme high temperatures. In addition, the hot and dry environment will be conducive to the growth and spread of some pests, and these pests are mainly cotton bollworm, which will damage flowers and fruits on plant trees, resulting in a decline in final yield.

Recently, some coffee plants in Vietnam have withered and yellowed their leaves, some of which are attacked by insect pests in addition to excessive drought.

According to reports, at present, Calais Province, which is the main coffee producing area in central Vietnam, has not been controlled by cotton bollworm, and the pest spreads quickly, so the current situation is very serious.

But in May, the weather will improve slightly, and it will rain in Vietnam. Vietnam's local meteorological department said that the rainfall in May may be about 2.27 mm, which will ease the current drought.

Recently, the International Coffee Organization released statistics in recent months that global coffee exports increased by 8.1% to 12.99 million bags in March 2024, so coffee futures prices have been falling in recent days even if future production is not optimistic in many producing countries.