In response to the threat posed by the coffee berry borer, state agriculture officials are preparing to establish a quarantine on the transport of green coffee beans from South Kona.
The pest’s presence was confirmed Sept. 8. Hawaii was one of the few remaining coffee-producing areas in the world that had not been infested by the bug, which has been known to cut crop production up to 20 percent.
Lyle Wong, plant industry administrator with the state Department of Agriculture, said Friday the Plants and Animals Advisory Committee would meet in a week or so on whether to recommend a quarantine be enacted.
advertisement He said a meeting was held Monday, but due to a failure to advertise it six days beforehand, another meeting must be called.
“What went before the advisory board was a proposal for quarantine of the whole Kona coast, but we will have to do it again,” he said.
If the pest is deemed an “immediate emergency” and the committee passes the recommendation, it will go before the Department of Agriculture board for approval and implementation, Wong said.
A quarantine means that green, or non-roasted, coffee beans would have to be treated with heat or an insecticide before they could be shipped off island.
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As an alternative to consuming beverages with unknown levels of possibly harmful ingredients, why not have a cup of coffee? And, no, we are not subsidized by the coffee industry. The common 8-ounce cup of coffee provides about 100 milligrams of caffeine. The amount of caffeine, however, depends on the type of coffee and the strength of the brew. For example, just 1 fluid ounce of espresso can provide 65 mg of caffeine.
In attempts to find health problems caused by coffee, thousands of studies have been conducted. Many of these were looking for health risks and found none. Other studies actually found health benefits. Most research on coffee supports the concept that if coffee was recently discovered in a faraway location, coffee would be the hottest selling herbal beverage in the health food market. Question: What potential health benefits are linked to coffee drinking?
Answer: Epidemiological studies that look for positive and negative associations with health have identified some encouraging links to specific health benefits. Although these results can’t prove cause and effect, they indicate those who drink coffee have a decreased risk for conditions like type 2 diabetes, Parkinson’s disease, liver disease, Alzheimer’s disease and colorectal cancer. Overall, the more recent well-designed studies have found no association between coffee consumption and cancers in general. There also is evidence that coffee consumption helps to prevent tooth decay.
Question: Why would coffee be beneficial to health?
Answer: Coffee contains many things besides caffeine. Two cups of strong coffee provide as much potassium as a medium banana and about 40 percent of the daily need for the vitamin pantothenic acid. In addition to these nutrients, coffee also contains compounds with names like chlorogenic acid, cafestol and kahweol. Finding potential positive and negative aspects of these compounds is an ongoing area of research. Chlorogenic acid may be the key component that contributes to the reduced risk of type 2 diabetes. Cafestol and kahweol, present mainly in unfiltered coffee, are thought to contribute to a small but significant increase in blood cholesterol levels, but also may help to prevent cancer.
Question: Is there a downside to drinking too much coffee?
Answer: Everything in life seems to have its diminishing point of return. A report from Health Canada concluded that caffeine intake up to 400 mg per day is not associated with adverse health effects in healthy adults. However, caffeine is a drug. And, like most drugs, individual sensitivity to caffeine can vary. For some, caffeine boosts blood pressure. Too much caffeine too close to bedtime can, of course, adversely affect sleep. The absorption of iron from foods can be decreased when coffee is consumed with the food. It is commonly recommended that women who are pregnant, lactating, or planning pregnancy do not consume more than 300 mg of caffeine per day (about three 8-ounce cups of coffee). There is conflicting evidence that excess coffee consumption (more than four cups per day) during pregnancy can increase the risk of childhood acute lymphoid leukemia.
Joannie Dobbs, Ph.D., C.N.S., and Alan Titchenal, Ph.D., C.N.S., are nutritionists in the Department of Human Nutrition, Food and Animal Sciences, College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources, University of Hawaii-Manoa. Dobbs also works with University Health Services.
In 2008, a report from the University of Hawaii-Manoa and the state Department of Agriculture estimated that between 85 percent and 90 percent of the state’s food was imported every year and concluded that there wasn’t much anyone could do to change the situation.
” … Even though Hawaii can conceivably grow anything that we consume, the quest to achieve 100% food self-sufficiency is impractical, unattainable and perhaps impossible, as it imposes too high a cost for society,” the researchers said.
Hawaii’s relatively small farms could never match the output or efficiency of the vast mechanized farms on the mainland, the report said. Island products would always be more expensive to grow and buy.
Still, the report was more a call to arms than a dark prophecy.
Pointing out that Hawaii’s geographic isolation left its food supply vulnerable to disruptions caused by forces and events beyond control, such as fuel costs, shipping strikes and farm production fluctuations, the report said it was of vital importance that the state not overlook the value of a small but thriving home-grown market.
A healthy agricultural base not only serves as a buffer against outside forces, it provides residents with fresher, tastier, healthier food and could put millions of dollars back into the island economy, the report said.
“I think we are at the crossroads,” says Dr. Matthew Loke, administrator of the state’s Agricultural Development Division and a co-author of the 2008 report with Dr. PingSun Leung of UH-Manoa’s College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources. “Whether we can seize those opportunities or not, that’s our challenge.”
KAILUA-KONA, — Authorities would have to quarantine Big Island coffee beans if state and federal officials don’t find the coffee berry borer pest on other islands in the state.
State Department of Agriculture Plant Industry Division Administrator Lyle Wong says a quarantine would mean growers would have to follow quarantine rules regarding treatment of the beans.
West Hawaii Today reported Wong said Monday growers wouldn’t be prohibited from shipping their beans to other islands.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture earlier this month confirmed the pest native to central Africa has been found in several coffee farms in Kona.
The bug has been known to kill off about 20 percent of coffee crops in other parts of the world.
In 2008, there were 202 requests (more than twice the number of requests in 2006 and 2007), and 137 of those were approved.
Across the nation in 2009, 5,177 workers entered the U.S. under the
H-2A program, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
The problem is supply versus demand.
“If Hawaii is going to increase its agricultural sector, somebody’s gonna have to do the work in the fields,” said Mae Nakahata, president of the Hawaii Farm Bureau Federation, which represents 1,600 members in the local agricultural industry. “A lot of the local people don’t want to do that type of work, so where is that labor going to come from?”
Nakahata said many farms are tiny, family operations that can’t handle the workload by themselves.
“A lot of our farmers are dependent on second and third parties to get their labor because they’re not large companies,” Nakahata said. “They depend on the contractor, and that the contractor is doing its job correctly.”
Many local farms relied on Global Horizons Manpower Inc., a Los Angeles-based recruiting contractor whose president and associates are now accused in what’s been called the largest human trafficking scheme ever prosecuted in the U.S.
Federal investigators allege that Global Horizons, headed by Mordechai Orian, hired Thai workers under false promises of high wages, but later revoked their traveling documents and violated their rights.
The Global Horizons case involves about 400 farmers who passed through Hawaii from May 2004 through September 2005. The case includes 14 farms around the state, including Maui Pineapple Farms, Aloun Farms, Del Monte Hawaii and the Kauai Coffee Co.
None of the farms is being accused of wrongdoing in the case. Aloun Farms’ owners face trial in a separate case involving 44 Thai workers who claim to have been abused.
“Local farms are in a tough situation now,” said Nakahata. “How do you evaluate whether the contract you’re going for is legitimate?
