BELO HORIZONTE, Brazil — This month, from the 25th–27th October, thousands of coffee professionals will travel from across the world to Belo Horizonte, Brazil, where they will have the opportunity to cup and buy hundreds of specialty coffees.
Brazil International Coffee Week (Icw) is the biggest coffee festival in Brazil, and last year its 14,000 visitors were able to taste 2,250 cups in over 30 cupping events. It led to an astronomical R$ 25 million (nearly US$ 8 million) of commerce, making it an opportunity not to be missed for any coffee buyer, trader, or farmer.
Brazil is responsible for producing roughly a third of the world’s green coffee (MIT’s Observatory of Economic Complexity), with a 2016 harvest of 55-million 60-kilo bags of green beans (ICO).
Yet this coffee-producing giant isn’t just known for its great quantity of coffee: it’s also becoming increasingly known for its specialty lots.
From the high-altitude regions of Caparaó to the sweet Cerrado Mineiro coffees, which have been awarded Designation of Origin, Brazil offers a wide range of traceable 80+ coffees with good transport links to the US and further abroad.
Buyers will be able to cup all these coffees, including the Coffee of the Year Brazil (to be chosen at the event) and the nine runners-up.
The three-day event will also focus on supporting farmers in producing better-quality coffee, through the Sustainable Agriculture Forum 2017; the Producers’ Meeting at the Café+Forte Program; Educampo Café Meetings, which focuses on providing better training for coffee producers; and the International Women’s Coffee Alliance Brazil Meeting. In particular, controlled fermentation will take centre-stage, in line with Brazil’s continuing interest in fermentation and the international market’s interest in it.
Icw will also feature the 12 th Espaço Café Brasil, an exhibitors’ space; Coffee DNA 2017, a symposium attended by industry leaders through Brazil and abroad; Model Coffee Shop, which offers practical workshops for entrepreneurs; the Barista Cup 2017, a Brazil-wide competition measuring espresso, cappuccino, and filter preparation; and a Roasting Course from Torra Lab. Additionally, the event will feature the World Coffee Events Re:verb Brazil, which will examine roasting in depth.
In 2018, Brazil Icw will also host the World Latte Art Championship and World Coffee In Good Spirits Championship, both of which will be taking place in November in Belo Horizonte.
Held in Minas Gerais, Brazil’s largest coffee-producing state, attendees will have the opportunity to not just cup coffees and build relationships with producers but also arrange farm visits, should they be interested.
