Brazil's crops were hit this year by the worst drought in a century, followed by waves of unprecedented cold and frost that covered the land of Brazil with snow, which negatively affected Brazilian crops and thus shook global commodity markets.
The farms that dot the vast plains and mountainous regions that circle the Atlantic coast produce four-fifths of the world's exports of oranges, half of sugar exports, a third of coffee exports, and a third of a part of soybeans and corn, which are used to feed laying hens and livestock.
According to a recent study published in the journal Economica, there is a 10% decline in Brazilian crop yields over the next three decades, a period when the world's population is expected to grow by more than a fifth.
She noted that the devastation in Brazil gave a glimpse into that future. Between droughts and frosts, crops were damaged on about 1.5 million square kilometers of land, an area the size of Peru.
The coffee losses are most impressive: up to 1.3 billion pounds of beans were destroyed, enough to make all the cups Americans drink over the course of four months.
A report published by the Peruvian newspaper “Jestion” indicated that the famous coffee beans belonging to the Arabica factory decreased by 30% in just 6 days last July, which led to a significant increase in prices, and its price rose to 1.9410 dollars per pound per hour on the New York Stock Exchange. .
The price of coffee futures rose this year 2021, after drought hit agricultural crops in the largest coffee producer in the world, before it was later affected by a frost.
The global coffee market is worth about $104 billion. Brazil reaps about half of the world's crop from growing coffee beans used in making coffee, and occupies the first place in the export, and Brazil's annual revenues from this product amount to 51.6 billion dollars, or 3.5% of its gross domestic product.
Price hikes are contributing to high rates of international food inflation (the UN index is up 33% in the past 12 months), exacerbating financial hardship amid the pandemic and forcing millions of low-income families to reduce food purchases around the world.
In addition, scientists predict that rising global temperatures and lower soil moisture will increasingly cause havoc on farmland in Brazil and in much of the world.
"It's a vicious cycle," said Marcelo Silucci, a meteorologist at Brazil's Natural Disaster Warning and Monitoring Center. “It does not rain because there is no moisture, and there is no moisture because it does not rain.”
He says deforestation in the Amazon plays an important role.
According to his calculations, Brazil has not had a normal rainy season since 2010, adding, "It was a very strange year." "Floods in Germany and China, and there is a very serious drought problem in Brazil."
The report noted that there is also drought across the borders in Argentina and in Chile, Canada, Mexico and Russia. The situation in the United States was diverse this summer: the West has been devastated by record heat waves, wildfires and severe droughts, as in Brazil, huge lakes and rivers are drying up and hydroelectric power is running out; While the east of the country was inundated by tropical storms and deadly floods.
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