MILAN – Every year, the Producer & Roaster Forum brings together coffee professionals from across the globe – whether in-person or virtually. Each PRF event focuses on one origin country, where it hosts the event: PRF Colombia 2022 will be the fifth of its kind. Previous host countries include El Salvador, Brazil, Guatemala, and Honduras.
Julio Guevara, Director of PRF, says: “Groundbreaking valuable events at origin have always been lacking in the coffee industry. We need to take the conversation and platform to where they have more impact – a coffee-producing country.
The ultimate goal of PRF 2022 is to drive green coffee sales for the Colombian coffee sector. In 2021, Virtual PRF facilitated more than US $10 million in sales in Honduras.
With more than 5,000 people from over 50 countries expected to attend PRF Colombia 2022, this number is expected to increase even further.
Henry Wilson, the founder of PDG Global, says: “PRF’s aim is to create the world’s best coffee event by bringing experts and roasters from around the world together with the people in the industry that deserve the most credit and attention: the producers.
“It’s simple: we want to drive meaningful industry-wide discussion with producers at the table.”
Producer & Roaster Forum 2022: Origin Trip Experience
For roasters, PRF Colombia 2022 will offer the unique PRF Origin Trip Experience.
By traveling to Colombia, roasters from around the world will be supported to build long-lasting friendships and business relationships with the farmers who produce their coffees.
As with previous years, the PRF Origin Trip Experience takes place over the three days before the in-person forum.
- Roasters will be placed in groups of 20 to stay with hosts on various coffee farms in different coffee-growing regions.
- Roasters get the chance to meet farmers, as well as visit wet and dry mills.
- Roasters can take part in a series of activities on the farms, including harvesting and processing.
- Roasters can take part in cupping sessions and roundtable discussions with producers.
Prf 2022: The Forum
After the Origin Trip, both roasters and producers will meet at the two-day PRF Colombia 2022 forum in Medellín.
This will include an extensive programme of talks, educational workshops, cuppings, presentations from global industry leaders, and networking opportunities for both producers and roasters.
“More and more coffee-producing countries are investing in internal consumption and turning towards specialty coffee,” Julio explains. “PRF provides the opportunity for stakeholders across the industry to witness this transition first-hand.
“PRF also allows the host country to close the gap between commercial and specialty coffee by learning more about global trends in the coffee industry,” he adds.
However, the ultimate goal of PRF is to drive sales of green Colombian coffee, as Henry explains.
“Looking at an example from a PRF event a few years ago, one of the first-ever farm visit hosts from PRF El Salvador is now receiving orders for three containers of coffee,” he says. “Before PRF, his orders were for a few bags.
“This is an increase of millions of dollars from just one transaction with one exporter. The opportunity for producers to build multimillion dollar trade deals at PRF is clearly there.”
Over 150 roasters are expected to attend PRF this year, as well as thousands of local Colombian coffee producers, traders, roasters, and café owners.
