HCM CITY — The seventh Buôn Ma Thuột coffee festival will be held in March in the Central Highlands province of Đắk Lắk with a wide range of activities featuring local specialties, including locally produced coffee beans.

Themed “Quintessence of the Great Forest”, the biennial festival will take place from March 9-16 with diverse programmes.

Speaking at a press conference held on Tuesday in Buôn Ma Thuột, Nguyễn Tuấn Hà, vice chairman of the province people’s committee, who is deputy head of the festival’s organising board, said the Central Highlands region has great potential for coffee plantations and exports.

“Cultivation of coffee trees is the main livelihood of farmers in the Central Highlands,” he said. “The Buôn Ma Thuột coffee festival plays an essential role in promoting the trademark Buôn Ma Thuột coffee and Việt Nam’s coffee to the international market.”

The Central Highlands province of Đắk Lắk boasts the country’s largest coffee-growing area, with a total area of about 204,000 hectares, producing 460,000 tonnes of coffee beans annually, accounting for 36 per cent of the country’s total output, according to Hà.

Coffee from Đắk Lắk is exported to some 100 countries and territories.

The province will organise the 2019 Đắk Lắk conference to call for investment in agriculture, the processing industry, renewable energy, and infrastructure for tourism and urban areas, he said. 

Miss Universe Việt Nam 2017 H’Hen Niê, who is the media ambassador of the festival, will participate in major programmes at the festival.

“It’s my great honour to be the ambassador of the festival to promote the brand of Buôn Ma Thuột coffee and Vietnamese coffee in the international market,” she said. 

The festival will feature a diverse range of activities, including an opening and closing ceremony, and a seminar on the development of Vietnamese specialty coffee.

There will also be an exhibition on global coffee history, a street festival, a Vietnamese specialty coffee quality competition, free coffee tasting, a Buôn Đôn elephant festival, and an international paragliding contest.
The event aims to promote Buôn Ma Thuột coffee brand, develop specialty coffee, and gradually turn Buôn Ma Thuột city into a destination for coffee aficionados worldwide.
It also aims to honour domestic coffee growers, processors and traders while encouraging the community to join hands to develop the coffee culture.

The event commemorates the 44th anniversary of the Buôn Ma Thuột Victory (March 10, 1975 - March 10, 2019).

Buôn Ma Thuột is home to some of the finest coffee in Việt Nam. Coffee was first cultivated in Việt Nam in 1857. Việt Nam’s coffee growing area has reached 20,000ha. The country exports 1.8 million tonnes of coffee beans, raking in $3.2 billion per year. 

Việt Nam is the world’s second largest coffee exporter, after Brazil. — VNS