The power of a global coffee community – words by 2017 World Barista Champion Dale Harris.
Coffee is a beautiful industry. It's also one full of contradictions and challenges. The issues facing specialty coffee – and the world more broadly – won't be solved by individuals or single companies. They'll be solved by shared goals, honest dialogue, and people choosing to work together. Here, Dale Harris – 2017 World Barista Champion – reflects on speaking at Tamper Tantrum right here at our Auckland eatery, and what it made him think about the collective power we all hold.
I fell in love with coffee, and eventually chose it as my career, not because of its flavours or the warmth of the café, or even the satisfaction of adjusting a brewing parameter and watching it shape a guest's experience. I chose it because coffee is an incredible lens through which you can understand the world a little better.
The history of coffee takes us through exploration, empire, religion, democracy, the Enlightenment, and the reconstruction of Vietnam. The journey from a farm at origin to an espresso in a café relies on a complex web of road systems, ports, shipping containers, and financial instruments that simply didn't exist sixty years ago. The social impact of coffee today lets us visualise urbanisation, gentrification, the greying of farming communities, and shifting work patterns for demographics of people previously unimagined. Every farm, every producing region, is a living example of what climate change is doing to livelihoods and yields – and therefore to the price of coffee for drinkers on the other side of the world.
Coffee connects us all. But the community that views and values it in this way is small. Baristas and roasters in Auckland, London, or Lima spend most of their time talking to customers, and very little listening to each other or collaborating with counterparts in other cities. The internet and social media have enabled more connection than ever – but let's be honest, they've amplified marketing and pretty pictures far more effectively than they have meaningful conversation between like-minded people.
Speaking at Tamper Tantrum gave me a chance to share ideas I rarely get to air in my daily work – and doing it in Auckland, in a room full of people who genuinely care about this industry, made those ideas feel a little more urgent. Having spent most of my life behind a bar, I know this career can be a genuine vocation. But it can also feel like a role that doesn't let you make an impact on a bigger scale, or push back on the problems affecting the industry. What I've come to understand is that, despite those limitations, the ability to network and communicate as a collective has never been more powerful. If we use the tools we have and work together, the global barista community can influence consumer choices, educate people on the impact of those choices, and help them understand the connection they share with coffee producers at origin.
Here's the thing: it has never been more expensive to produce coffee. Yet the price achieved on the market – inflation aside – is lower than it was ten years ago. That's not sustainable. Rising temperatures will shrink viable growing land. But the reality is more nuanced than the headlines suggest, and equally serious: it's not so much that coffee will disappear, but that better-tasting coffee will. The kind that needs investment, stability, and a reliable growing season. The only viable model left, if nothing changes, is high-volume, low-quality – and that's a future nobody in this industry wants. By exploring different ways of buying and serving coffee, and farming practices that allow net positive carbon capture, every part of this industry – particularly farm and café workers, who've historically had the least power – can take a meaningful step in the right direction.