The Center for Coffee Research & Education (CCRE) was established in September 2016 as part of the Norman Borlaug Institute for International Agriculture at Texas A&M University. Their mission is to improve quality and supply of coffee globally through research and capacity building.
With 2.25 billion cups consumed every day and 170 billion dollars spent on coffee annually, directly involving 25 million producers and providing the main source of income for an estimated 100 million people worldwide, coffee is one of the world’s most culturally and economically important agricultural commodities. Yet, despite coffee’s tremendous significance, the majority of coffee farmers around the world live below the poverty line. Additionally, the industry is facing serious obstacles, caused by pests, diseases, climate change issues, narrow genetic diversity, unstable market prices, etc. These serious threats cause hardship for all who work in the industry, leading to increased poverty, reduced food security and contributing to surges of immigration from Latin America to the United States.
Join us and learn how CCRE is actively researching ways to support and increase the production of high quality coffee through its initiatives, while leading the effort to provide education and training opportunities to students and industry professionals of all levels and fields of study.