Within the framework of the Hostelco show, the second edition of Área Café will be held, an event that will open the doors to the main national and international representatives of the coffee sector. This event, organized by FIRA or the Barcelona Events Fair and FELAC (Spanish Federation of Associations of manufacturers of hospitality machinery, collectivities and related industries) will be a space in which producers, exporters, roasters, manufacturers of machinery and complementary products will present all the novelties of a key market of the Spanish hospitality industry.This important event will be held from 17 to 21 October 2008 at the Montjuïc venue in Barcelona, Spain, and will feature the participation of the most important experts who will show the widest range of the latest developments in machinery, equipment, products and services for hotels, restaurants and communities.
The show will bring together more than 2,300 direct and represented exhibitors. For this year, the organizers foresee an influx of about 100,000 national and international visitors from all countries of the world.
Hostelco 2008 will bring together in the coffee area event professionals and companies from the entire value chain of the product: from large farms , cooperatives, coffee exporting and importing associations and the roasting process, to the cup, through machinery, add-ons and coffee shop franchises.
In Área Café there will also be activities such as the final phase of the National Barista Contest (a contest in which participants will have to demonstrate their ability to prepare different types of coffees and know how to transmit the knowledge they have about the product), the choice of the "best green coffee", coffee tastings, tasting courses, keynote lectures on the relationship between coffee, health and gastronomy, presentations on the recovery of coffee from Agaete (municipality located in Gran Canaria, southern island of Spain), and simultaneous wine and coffee tastings.
In its first edition, held in 2006, Área Café was among the top 5 preferred sectors among visitors, occupied more than 6,000 gross square meters, had about 60 companies in the sector, and hosted the first National Barista Championship.
It should be noted that Spain is the fourth largest buyer of coffee on the European continent and seventh worldwide, and Barcelona is a city that, in addition to having numerous establishments such as coffee shops and "Coffee Shops", has the only port in the Mediterranean that has the two approvals London International Financial Futures and Options Exchange (LIFFE) and the New York Board of Trade (NYBOT). In this way, this port becomes the main recipient of coffee in Spain and places the city among the nerve centers of this market worldwide.
In addition, the importance of this event lies in the fact that it is the main meeting point for the most influential members of the coffee sector of the European continent and because it also brings together the entire universe of this drink in one place.
