Indonesia’s top barista, brewer, latte artist and cup taster of 2019 were announced at the national finals of the Indonesia Coffee Events (ICE) that took place at the Kuningan City mall, Jakarta, on Feb. 24.
First place in the categories of top barista, brewer, latte artist and cup taster were won by Mikael Jasin from Common Grounds Jakarta, Muhammad Fakhri, Restu Sadam Hasan from Hungry Bird Coffee Bali and Rahmat Fatrianto from Kopiteori Makassar, South Sulawesi, respectively.
Antara reported that the winners of the brewer and barista categories would represent Indonesia at the World Barista Championship and the World Brewer Championship in Boston, United States from April 11 to 14, while the winners of the latte art and cup tester categories are to represent the country at the World Latte Art Championship and the World Cup Tester Championship in Berlin, Germany from June 8 to 10.
This year’s ICE used the theme #coffeeconnectspeople as an embodiment of how specialty coffee becomes a gateway to innovation and human interaction.
“Specialty coffee is not only about the products but also about the human interactions that revolve around it. Those with a purpose tend to start communicating with anyone, such as farmers with barista, roasters with coffee connoisseurs and, of course the most classic of all, interactions between coffee lovers in a coffee shop,” Yudistira Bawono, the committee chairman of ICE 2019, said in a release sent to Antara.
The news agency reported that a market intelligence study released by Mintel in mid-2018 recorded that Indonesia is in the top five of the world’s retail coffee market. That study also predicted that the Indonesian retail coffee market would grow by 11.4 percent between 2017 and 2021.
Projected to become the retail coffee market with the highest growth in the world, Indonesia has shown its potential with more than 1,000 coffee shops serving specialty coffees, according to Euromonitor as quoted by Antara.
