Most of us can't start our day without a hot cup of coffee.

In fact, humans drink over 2.25 billion cups every day.

But coffee is more than just a morning ritual.

It's one of the most influential crops in human history, fueling empires and toppling them.

And to understand just how revolutionary coffee was and still is, we have to go back over a thousand years to a flock of hyperactive goats.

One of the earliest tales we have about coffee comes from Ethiopia, where legend has it that around 850 C.E., a goat herder named Kaldi found his goats romping around the forest after eating the red fruit from a wild evergreen shrub.

That plant was coffea arabica.

It's native to Ethiopia, Sudan, and Kenya.

And that stimulating effect that many of us need to get our day started is from caffeine.

It's a naturally occurring compound that not only gives us a morning jolt, but can also protect a plant from pests.

After witnessing the energizing effects of the coffee on his goats, Kaldi tried it himself and he too felt the buzz.

Whether or not Kaldi's story is true, coffee is thought to originate from Ethiopia.

At first, Ethiopians weren't sipping the morning brew that we're familiar with today.

They had a bunch of other uses for it.

They used the leaves and fruits to make tea.

The ground beans were mixed with animal fats to make a sort of energy bar, and they made a wine like drink from the fermented pulp of the coffee cherries.

Scholars believe that brewing coffee dates to the early 15th century, when coffea arabica made it to Yemen.

There, Sufi monks in the port city of Mokha began cultivating, roasting, and brewing coffee, or qahwa in Arabic, to help them concentrate during prayers.

Drinking coffee spread quickly through the Muslim world, expanding to Egypt, Syria, and the Ottoman Empire.

But not everyone was on board.

Religious scholars declared a fatwa against coffee, forbidding it because consuming anything burnt was prohibited under Islam.

But coffee was too irresistible, and Istanbul saw its first coffeehouse open in 1555.

There were a lot of perks to coffeehouses.

They were accessible to the masses.

A common ground that was relatively affordable didn't have as many social restrictions as mosques.

And, on some occasions, open to women and children.

So it's no surprise they became popular meeting places for people to get together, play games, listen to music and poetry, exchange news, and most dangerously, exchange ideas and get educated.

Coffeehouses became havens for freethinkers, making them a threat to those in power, which is why attempts to shut down coffee shops persisted for centuries.

Sultans even hired spies to infiltrate coffeehouses to get a sense of what their subjects were planning.

And in the 17th century, Sultan Murad the Fourth took extreme measures by decapitating coffee drinkers.

But coffeehouses were just too popular, as were nationalist movements pushing for independence.

Over hot cups of coffee, alliances were formed, revolutions were plotted, and by the late 1800s, the Ottoman Empire's power began to diminish as Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria achieved independence.

Coffee also shook up Europe, where it was the catalyst of both cultural revolutions and political ones.

Europe got Ahold of coffee beans in the early 1600s, which coincides with the Age of Enlightenment, a time when great thinkers and philosophers gathered in cafes to discuss new ideas, challenged tradition, talk business and push for social progress.

This period, which took place from 1680 to 1820, was marked by immense economic growth driven by scientific discovery and technological advancements that sparked the Industrial Revolution, but simultaneously fueled colonization and the slave trade.

At first, the English and Dutch East India companies purchased their beans through the Ottoman Empire and the port of mocha.

But it wasn't long until Europe circumvented these trade agreements.

After all, one of the philosophies behind colonization is why spend a bunch of money and resources trading with another country when we can steal this culturally significant food and produce it ourselves?

On land, we also steal.

Coffee only really thrives within the bean belt between the Tropic of Cancer and Capricorn.

And since Europe is nowhere near the bean belt, they stole land and labor from countries and regions where coffee could flourish.

In 1658, the Dutch started the first European owned coffee plantation in Ceylon, modern day Sri Lanka.

In order to control the means of production and capitalize on the growing demand over time, other European countries followed suit.

Setting up coffee plantations across their colonies, France produced coffee in the Caribbean and later in Vietnam.

Jesuit priest from Spain brought coffee to Colombia and Portugal turned Brazil into a coffee powerhouse.

As the cultivation of coffee grew, so did the demand for slavery, which is so counterintuitive to the other ideas that the Age of Enlightenment, inspired through the 1700s, talk of equality, individual freedom and democracy were starting to brew in coffee shops across Europe and the American colonies leading up to the American Revolution.

A group called the Sons of Liberty met at a coffee shop called the Green Dragon to complain about unjust treatment and plan the Boston Tea Party.

Drinking coffee in the 13 Colonies was also seen as a patriotic act of rebellion against the British.

The French Revolution also got its start in Parisian cafes on the night of July 13th, 1789, a prominent rabble rouser named Camille de Moulin gave a stirring speech at café de foi that was so intense, so moving, so bitter, it got crowds riled up enough to storm the Bastille.

Inspired by the American and French revolutions and the principles popularized by the Age of Enlightenment, Haiti launched its own revolution, demanding rights for enslaved people, many of whom worked on coffee plantations.

1000 plantations were destroyed.

By the time Haiti gained its independence in 1804, which crippled Haiti's coffee industry through the 19th and 20th centuries, coffee became more commercialized, further increasing its demand.

The introduction of Folgers in 1850 and Maxwell House in 1892 transitioned customers away from roasting their own beans at home to purchasing pre roasted pre-ground coffee, which made making a cuppa at home fast and easy.

And the coffeehouse boom really started to pick up speed in 1971 when Starbucks commercialized the concept of the third place.

Today, there are over 40,000 Starbucks shops worldwide, making it the second largest chain in the world after McDonald's.

Even after hundreds of years, coffee's popularity and its powerful influence shown no signs of slowing down, it is still one of the most popular drinks on the planet.

It's one of the most traded commodities on the global market, and the industry generates an estimated 200 billion USD in revenue worldwide each year.

But there are some serious issues with coffee's popularity.

One is the great lengths the industry goes to in order to meet the rising demand.

Though laws have been passed to abolish slavery, unethical practices that exploit labor are still a large part of coffee cultivation and trade.

Today, most of the world's coffee comes from countries that have a history of colonization Brazil, Vietnam and Colombia.

It's in these places where many farmers work under strenuous conditions.

And despite working so hard to harvest one of the world's most important crops, many still live in poverty.

Climate change is also putting a strain on coffee farmers, who are consistently losing acres of crops and income to rising temperatures, floods and droughts.

According to a 2014 study, we're estimated to potentially lose 50% of land suitable for coffee farming by 2050.

We're already feeling the effects of climate change on our wallets.

In 2024, prices went up 40% worldwide due to the impact of extreme weather events in the world's top coffee producing countries.

Droughts and Vietnam.

Heavy rains in Indonesia and dry weather in Brazil impacted crops, which put pressure on the global supply.

Of course, I'm not telling you to not drink coffee.

I have no less than six cups a day.

But there are ways to make sure you're getting your coffee from good sources that provide safe work environments and fair incomes to their workers, and employ sustainable agricultural practices to help protect the environment.

One way is to look for the Fair Trade Certified label in order to get this label.

Coffee companies have to meet a rigorous set of standards which ensures beans are being sourced ethically.

Every step of the way, from cultivation through production.

Scientists are also coming up with solutions to develop new species of coffee that can withstand the effects of climate change and make coffee farming a more sustainable business.

Despite there being roughly 120 different species, most of the world's supply currently comes from two varieties Arabica and Robusta.

Lack of biodiversity means that entire farms could be susceptible to extreme temperatures, unpredictable rainfall, and even blight.

That's why scientists are looking to wild coffee plants, whose unique DNA can be the key to breeding diverse plants that can weather climate change.

Coffee has been the fuel for our greatest ideas and our boldest rebellions for over a thousand years, and the revolution is far from over.

As we shift our focus towards sustainably sourced beans and ethical brands, coffee continues to drive scientific innovation and social change.