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There are many reasons why coffee prices are spiking right now. Among them is the uncertainty surrounding Trump’s threat to impose tariffs on countries like Canada, Mexico, and Colombia. In response, the National Coffee Association has requested that coffee be exempted from tariffs.
As Marcelo Teixeira and Seher Dareen report for Reuters, NCA president and CEO Bill Murray wrote to U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer to formally request the exemption. In the letter, Murray noted that the U.S. doesn’t produce enough coffee to meet demand, and warned that tariffs could lead prices to increase by up to 50%.
Teixeira and Dareen also noted how interconnected the North American coffee market is, with many large companies operating across Mexico, the U.S., and Canada. Nestlé, for example, recently announced they would be investing $1 billion in production plants in Mexico.
In his letter, Murray also pointed out how much the coffee industry contributes to the U.S. economy—$343 billion annually. He asked Greer to refrain from imposing additional tariffs on coffee-producing countries, writing that this would have “even more significant consequences.”
Read the full story from Reuters here.
