Coffee health and ethics

Coffee growing in Goias, Brazil

With it being April Fool's Day, I should flex my creative muscles, come up with some fantastic story and post it here. Or, with it being Easter Monday, I should write about Easter eggs (both the real and the "copycat" chocolate kind). In fact there is an interesting piece of news I came across yesterday relating to the ranking of chocolate Easter egg manufacturers according to their use of (unsustainable) palm oil. But I will follow my intuition and, instead, write about coffee.

I do love my quality and responsibly-sourced cup of coffee, and I am always interested to hear more about what effects it might be having on my body, as well as about where coffee comes from, how it is grown and what social and environmental effects the cultivation of coffee has. I am a regular at Monmouth Coffee Company in Covent Garden. It is my "creative haunt", as I have come to see it. I just came across this interesting, if superficial Alternet article on the (potential) good and bad effects of coffee on health/the human body: "10 things coffee does to your body". Makes an interesting read for those of us who are coffee lovers (or haters), and possibly gives us one more reason to drink coffee...responsibly.