[Photograph: Robyn Lee]

Whether you believe in climate change or not, the International Coffee Organization does, and it's saying that global warming is affecting growers in some coffee-growing countries and could lead to higher prices — all this according to an item from USAToday.com.

Nestor Osorio, the head of the organization, which met last week, said that, "In the last 25 years the temperature has risen half a degree in coffee producing countries, five times more than in the 25 years before."

Rising temperatures mean that growers need to find cooler pieces of land to grow their beans on — usually higher ground, which comes at a higher price.

While I haven't seen major price hikes yet at the grocery store, this item on the issue on Physorg.com has me preparing for them:

In Colombia, one of the world's largest producers, production slumped 30-35 percent while Costa Rica and El Salvador still struggled to recover from poor harvests in 2000-2005.

In that news item, the Coffee Association of Guatemala predicted a production drop of 28 percent in the first three months of this growing season in nine Latin American countries.

Time to start hoarding?