EP 1058 Part 3 of 5 | How Trump Changed the Global Coffee Trade (Jonas Leme Ferraresso) Map It Forward
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Episode Description
This is Part 3 of a 5-part series with Brazilian coffee agronomist Jonas Leme Ferraresso and Map It Forward Founder Lee Safar, exploring the realities behind Brazil's 2026 coffee harvest and the forces reshaping the global coffee industry.
Coffee doesn't move around the world in isolation. It moves through relationships, trade agreements, logistics, and geopolitics.
In recent years, few political decisions have had a greater impact on international trade than the tariff policies introduced during Donald Trump's presidency. While much of the public discussion focused on manufacturing and technology, the ripple effects extended into agriculture, including coffee.
In this episode, Jonas explains how tariffs and political tensions changed the pace of Brazilian coffee exports to the United States, why American roasters began sourcing coffee differently, and how Brazil responded by strengthening relationships with other trading partners around the world.
More importantly, this conversation explores why coffee businesses can no longer afford to ignore geopolitics. Trade relationships that once seemed stable are evolving rapidly, forcing producers, exporters, importers, and roasters to rethink how they manage risk.
Rather than viewing these events through a political lens, Jonas encourages us to see them as examples of how governments, trade policy, and international partnerships directly influence the movement of coffee across the global supply chain.
Whether you work in coffee sourcing, importing, roasting, green coffee trading, or simply want to understand why coffee markets have become so unpredictable, this episode offers valuable insight into one of the biggest structural shifts happening in the industry today.
Connect with Jonas Leme Ferraresso here: