Entered the "Coffee City" ... Busan City Signs Agreement with Global Specialty Coffee Association "Establishing Industry Infrastructure and Branding Coffee City"

Busan City Hall. [Image source=Getty Images]

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Kim Yong-woo] Busan City is embarking on a project to strengthen the coffee industry foundation and brand itself as a coffee city.

On the 25th at 2 p.m., Busan City announced that it will sign a business agreement with the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) at the International Protocol Room on the 7th floor of City Hall to foster the coffee industry in Busan.

Busan Mayor Park Hyung-jun and SCA CEO Yanis Apostolopoulos will attend the signing ceremony and sign the agreement in person. Other attendees will include Shin Kyung-hee, SCA Asia-Pacific Director; Jung Yeon-jung, SCA Korea Chapter Manager; Kim Hyung-gyun, Director of Busan Technopark; and Lee Beom-cheol, Head of Management at BEXCO Co., Ltd.

Headquartered in California, USA, the SCA is a non-profit organization composed of diverse members forming the global coffee chain, from coffee farmers to baristas and roasters. It strives to develop the specialty coffee industry through openness, inclusiveness, and knowledge sharing.

It organizes various international coffee events annually, such as the Coffee Expo, World of Coffee, World Coffee Championships, and Sensory Summit.

The World Coffee Championships is a dream stage for baristas worldwide. It gained attention when Jeon Ju-yeon, a barista from Momo's Coffee in Busan, won the World Barista Championship?the first Korean to do so.

Through this agreement, Busan City and the SCA will join forces to establish a foundation for the coffee industry in Busan and brand the city as a coffee city by hosting world-class coffee events.

The areas of cooperation include ▲ hosting long-term and sustainable domestic and international coffee events ▲ developing and promoting new projects linked to the parties' businesses.

Busan has three World Coffee Champions, which is rare globally. The city plans to seize opportunities to spread excellent coffee skills and culture.

This year, Busan City is promoting various projects to foster the coffee industry for the first time.

As a research and development project, it is completing the establishment of a "Green Bean Library Platform" for the digitalization of coffee taste.

While the existing coffee industry has developed based on experience, this project aims to assist optimal decision-making in the coffee industry through digitalization of coffee taste by objectively analyzing green beans based on data.

To brand the coffee city, Busan Tourism Organization is developing a coffee city brand image (BI) and widely promoting Busan as a coffee city through promotional videos, broadcasts, and feature articles.

To foster representative coffee festivals in Busan, the city supported the "Yeongdo Coffee Festival" and "Jeonpo Coffee Festival" with 70 million KRW and 30 million KRW respectively through a public contest targeting autonomous districts and counties.

The Yeongdo Coffee Festival became an opportunity to leap into a global coffee festival by linking with the Central American coffee cooperation project, with participation from 11 coffee companies from six Central American countries, achieving great success with about 105,000 attendees.

In Yeongdo-gu, where the population is declining, a project is underway to select eight young people preparing to start coffee shops and support their startup process.

In connection with the Yeongdo-gu urban regeneration project, the plan is to create a coffee-themed street around Bongnae-dong's wharf area, where Busan's representative coffee company "Momo's Coffee" and the coffee culture complex facility "Blueport 2021" are located.

Busan Mayor Park Hyung-jun said, "By signing an agreement with the world-renowned coffee association SCA, we plan to devote efforts to grow into a global coffee city."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.