Global warming could raise cost of beer, wine and coffee

Global warming could make life`s little pleasures such as chocolate, coffee and wine scarcer and costlier, scientists say.

Increasing bouts of extreme heat waves and droughts could hurt production of barley, a key beer ingredient, in the future. Losses of barley yield can be as much as 17 per cent, an international group of researchers estimated. That means beer prices on average would double, according to the study in Nature Plants journal. In countries like Ireland, where cost of a brew is already high, prices could triple.

The findings come a week after a United Nations report described consequences of dangerous levels of climate change including worsening food and water shortages, heat waves, rising sea levels and disease. Study co-author Steve Davis said the beer research was partly done to drive home the message that climate change is messing with all sorts of aspects of our daily lives.

Several scientists who weren`t part of this study said it was sound and perhaps a more effective way of communicating the dangers of global warming.

Scientists have long known that barley "is one of the most heat-sensitive crops globally," but this study connects that to something that people care about — the price of beer — so it`s valuable, said David Lobell, a Stanford University agriculture ecologist. Steve Davis, a lover of IPA beers, is one of those people who cares.

– This is a paper born of love and fear, he said

Worldwide barley is used for all sorts of purposes, mostly feeding livestock. Less than 20 per cent of the world`s barley is made into beer. But in the United States, Brazil and China, at least two-thirds of the barley goes into six-packs, drafts, kegs, cans and bottles. Davis and colleagues looked only at the combination of heat waves and drought, not the general warming that also should affect where barley is grown.

If emissions of heat-trapping gases from the burning of coal, oil and gas continue at the current rising pace, the likelihood of weather conditions hurting barley production will increase from about once a decade before 2050 to once every other year by the end of the century.

global warming

Nature Plants

higher beer price

higher coffee price

higher wine price

David Lobell

Steve Davis

IPA beer

production of barley