Global warming is likely to wipe out half of the coffee growing area in Ethiopia, the birthplace of the bean, according to a groundbreaking new study. Rising temperatures have already damaged some special areas of origin, with these losses being likened to France losing one of its great wine regions.

Ethiopia’s highlands also host a unique treasure trove of wild coffee varieties, meaning new flavour profiles and growing traits could be lost before having been discovered. However, the new research also reveals that if a massive programme of moving plantations up hillsides to cooler altitudes were feasible, coffee production could actually increase.

How climate change will brew a bad-tasting, expensive cup of coffee
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Coffee vies with tea as the world’s favourite beverage and employs 100 million people worldwide in farming the beans alone. But climate change is coffee’s greatest long-term threat, killing plantations or reducing bean quality and allowing the deadly coffee leaf rust fungus to thrive. Without major action both in the coffee industry and in slashing greenhouse gas emissions, coffee is predicted to become more expensive and worse-tasting.

The research combined climate-change computer modelling with detailed measurements of current ground conditions, gathered in fieldwork that covered a total distance of 30,000km within Ethiopia. It found that 40-60% of today’s coffee growing areas in Ethiopia would be unsuitable by the end of the century under a range of likely warming scenarios.

But the study, published in the journal Nature Plants, also shows that major relocation programmes could preserve or even expand the country’s coffee-growing areas. “There is a pathway to resilience, even under climate change,” said Aaron Davis, at the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew in the UK, who conducted the work with Ethiopian scientists. “But it is a hugely daunting task. Millions of farmers would have to change.”

However, by 2040, such moves uphill will have reached the top of Ethiopia’s mountains. “It literally reaches the ceiling, because you don’t have any higher place to go,” Davis said.....

Climate change might not feel that important if you’re living far away from a coastline. But that doesn’t mean your life won’t change. Lots of the items people love will likely be influenced by the changing climate in some way, and the popular Ethiopian coffee is a prime example.

Coffee makes up around a quarter of Ethiopia’s exports by value. But the effects of climate change might knock out large swaths of the country’s farming area. A team of researchers from the United Kingdom and Ethiopia doesn’t think all hope is lost, but saving the country’s coffee market is going to take some careful planning.

“We’ve been doing these studies for quite some time... most of the results were quite negative,” researcher Justin Moat from the Kew Royal Botanic Gardens in the United Kingdom told Gizmodo. “But the findings from this report show that there’s a large amount of area in Ethiopia in good conditions for coffee to be grown if we do something about it now.”

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The coffee plant’s needs are simple: warm weather and rain. But as you’re probably aware, humans are contributing to a changing climate by emitting greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. The consequences differ depending on the location, but most models show climate change resulting in a generally warmer, drier Ethiopia with less predictable seasonal weather patterns. Most of the country’s coffee comes from humid forests or shaded areas.

Africa’s largest airline group, Ethiopian Airlines, is pleased to announce that it has won the 2016 Airline Reliability Performance Award, for the 6th year in a row, from Bombardier Aerospace.

The Airline Reliability Performance Award recognizes operators of Bombardier CRJ Series regional jets and Q Series turboprops who have achieved the highest rates of dispatch reliability.

Group CEO Ethiopian Airlines, Mr. Tewolde GebreMariam, remarked: “We are honoured to receive Bombardier’s Airline Reliability Performance Award for the 6th consecutive year. In line with our continuous effort to provide our customers a seamless travel experience, Bombardier Q400 NextGen aircrafts has enabled us offer the best on board experience on our regional and domestic routes. Moreover, through our strategic partnerships with ASKY Airlines in Togo and Malawian Airlines in Malawi, the Q400 airliner has played a vital role in availing convenient connections, as well as increasing frequencies to support air travel growth in Africa and successfully create a missing link. I wish to thank our Engineering team at Ethiopian MRO, Turbo Prop and Light A/C team as well as the Bombardier Field Service representatives for this notable milestone.”

Ethiopian flies the Q-400 to 20 domestic destinations and regional routes such as Djibouti, Mombasa, Kilimanjaro, Dar-es-Salaam, Zanzibar, Entebbe, Kigali, Juba, Khartoum and Hargeisa.

Ethiopian is multi award winning carrier and has recently been crowned as ‘African Airline of the Year 2017 Award’, ‘Cargo Airline Award for Network Development at Brussels’ in June and March respectively.

Source: Ethiopian Airlines Press Release

Ethiopian Airlines Enterprise plans to buy 10 of Airbus SE’s newest A350 wide-body jets in a transaction worth more than $3 billion at advertised prices, according to people familiar with the plan.

The deal is set to be announced this week at the Paris Air Show, according to the people, who asked not to be named as the order negotiations are private. Ethiopian will take the mid-sized A350-900 version of the plane, which has a list price of $311 million, according to one person.

Sub-Saharan Africa’s largest carrier already has an order for 12 -900 variants, though it has also been looking at the stretched -1000, as well as Boeing Co.’s rival 777-8, Chief Executive Officer Tewolde Gebre Mariam said last year.

Saudi Gazette report RIYADH — Competent authorities in Ethiopia have completed the procedures for sending 2,800 domestic workers to the Kingdom. An official source in the Ethiopian Consulate General in Jeddah confirmed that employment offices in Ethiopia, estimated at about 150, were making preparations to send the domestic workers. They are waiting for the completion

Saudi Gazette report RIYADH — Competent authorities in Ethiopia have completed the procedures for sending 2,800 domestic workers to the Kingdom. An official source in the Ethiopian Consulate General in Jeddah confirmed that employment offices in Ethiopia, estimated at about 150, were making preparations to send the domestic workers. They are waiting for the completion