Prof. Stuart McCook, Department of History, spoke with CBC Radio’s Ideas program to discuss the history of coffee.

McCook was among eight coffee experts who contributed to the hour-long episode, titled “The Coffee Chronicles: The story of the world’s most popular drink.”

He spoke about coffee leaf rust, a fungus that has devastated many coffee plantations over the years.

He studies the environmental history of tropical crops and commodities, especially global tropical crop disease outbreaks in the 19th and 20th centuries. He wrote the book Coffee is Not Forever: A Global History of the Coffee Rust.