Can coffee thrive in the shadow of the city?

Mike Sim preparing coffee beans for roasting. Bertha Wang/CNN via CNN Newsource

Hong Kong — A coffee roaster hums like an idling train in the attic of LCC Roastery, churning out freshly cooked beans at the artisan coffee seller on Hong Kong’s Lantau Island.

Owner Ringo Lam is proud of the broad selection of beans on offer: a jar labeled “Ethiopia” promises a mix of “jasmine, floral, tropical fruit, pineapple” flavors. Another, from Colombia, offers hints of “butter, caramel, dark chocolate.”

But one stands out: “Lantau Bean.”

That jar holds Lam and his fellow coffee lovers’ daring dream to pioneer what many didn’t know was possible: growing coffee in the shadow of a metropolis.

The 55-year-old former tech entrepreneur has been working closely with farmers on Lantau –– an island known for its greenery and laidback lifestyle, a 30-minute ferry ride from Hong Kong’s bustling city centre –– in a quest to cultivate the city’s very own beans.

Asia produces some of the world’s finest coffee, mostly in the southeastern part of the continent where a tropical climate blesses countries like Vietnam and Indonesia with a conducive environment.

In East Asia, love for the drink has grown exponentially in the past decade. But less favorable conditions –– namely, annual periods of extreme cold –– have hindered countries such as Japan and China from developing their crops (save for a few high-altitude, mountainous areas like the Yunnan region in mainland China or Alishan Mountain Range in Taiwan, where premium Arabica can still thrive.)

Hong Kong, a Chinese city of 7.5 million people who live mostly in urban areas, has more than 700 cafes but has never been seen as an ideal breeding ground for coffee beans. It has a stronger cultural attachment to tea and – disruptive summer typhoons aside – exorbitant land prices have made it more logical for the financial hub to import almost all of its own grains and vegetables rather than grow them. Let alone coffee beans.

So when Lam tells people about his ambitious plan, he often leaves them in bewilderment.

“All they see are just countries that you probably won’t plan to go,” Lam told CNN, jokingly giving a few examples. “Ethiopia, Colombia – that’s definitely not your top tourist places.”

“But suddenly, when someone is growing coffee so close to you, they will ask, ‘Can we really grow coffee in Hong Kong?’” he said.

The answer, it turns out, is yes. While high altitudes may boost flavor and complexity, it’s a misconception that coffee trees only thrive there. What determines their growth is whether the region falls under the so called the “coffee belt,” which is about 25 degrees north and south of the equator, says Katie Chick, an arboriculture instructor involved in running a coffee farm linked to the University of Hong Kong. Sitting 22 degrees north of the equator, the city is just within that band.

“Geographically speaking, Hong Kong is fit to grow. We just lack a bit of altitude,” said Chick, the assistant director of the university’s Centre for Civil Society and Governance. While many of the world’s most popular coffee regions are at more than 1,000 metres above sea level, Hong Kong’s highest point is less than that, and its farms are low-lying.

Chick said daily temperatures fluctuate more drastically high up in mountainous areas, which may spark more biochemical reactions in the beans, leading to more a complex taste.

“But that’s not the only requirement,” she said.

Her centre runs the biggest coffee farm in Hong Kong, with 800 trees yielding up to 50 kilograms of beans per year. It was originally envisioned as a project to revitalize an old village in the countryside, but now Chick and her colleagues are selling their beans at local markets.

For Lam, it all started on a trip to Panama six years ago. He was there to visit some farmers and study how the industry works. During that trip, he was given 100 coffee seeds to take home.

The cross-Pacific transplant mission was not a sure bet: not every seed will bud, and coffee plants often take two to three years to bear fruit.

“Out of all those 100 seeds, about 80 something came out,” he said, telling of how he called up every farmer he knew on the island, asking them to take in the seedlings.

Initially, five farmers said yes, Lam recalled, with more convinced to join later. Through trial and error, they managed to preserve and grow the seedlings.

Now, 25 farmers nurture about 400 coffee trees on Lantau Island. Earlier this year, they harvested their largest batch of coffee cherries yet, measuring 10 kilograms, almost 10 times their first yields in 2023.

An annual gathering now brings together local coffee farmers, including those on Lantau and Chick’s team from HKU, to brainstorm ways to refine their techniques.

Despite the success, these farmers aren’t seeking to upend a global coffee trade dominated by Latin America and Southeast Asia, or overthrow established growers. In fact, very few are selling their yields solely as a product, as the high costs of production make it hardly commercially viable.

The yields are also nowhere near any of the top producing countries. The 10-kilograms record harvest Lam and his fellow farmers bagged this year wouldn’t fill a 60 kilograms bag used as the industry’s basic unit of trade.

By comparison, farmers in Brazil, the world’s biggest coffee grower, produced 63 million of those bags last year, according to the US Department of Agriculture.

And how does it taste? CNN samples of two separate Hong Kong-grown coffees revealed a smooth and easy drink, though lacking in the complexity of a batch you’d pick up at a city-centre speciality brewer.

That forces many in the fledgling local industry to innovate –– trialing different wash processes to refine the taste and holding workshops to build awareness –– in the hope of maximizing the value and impact of their home-grown crops.

Mike Sim, founder of Seed to Cup, a group that promotes local coffee, is finding ways to leave a lasting impression despite the Hong Kong origin not being widely available.

The computer engineer has rented a farm in Fanling, in northern Hong Kong, where he works to perfect his beans while running education workshops on the side.

Last year, he partnered with a barista in a coffee-making contest to showcase a batch he grew, which was mixed with Colombian varietal.

They didn’t win, but Sim touted it as a big step forward. “We showed people that there are farms in Hong Kong now working with baristas [in these competitions],” he said, adding that this year they intend to compete with solely locally grown beans.

One of Lam’s Lantau farmers is Chan Fung-ming, who quit her job as a social worker to take over her family’s farm a few years ago.

Specializing in horticultural therapy, she advocates the use of gardening to improve people’s well-being. She’s hoping to use coffee to introduce farming to youngsters.

“I think it’s a medium to bring people into the world of planting,” she said.

Alongside his roastery, Lam also runs a workshop that lets participants pick coffee cherries from trees and process them from scratch, which he says offers visitors a taste of the back-breaking routine farm workers in far-off places must go through every day to keep the world caffeinated.

The aim, he says, is to show that these workers deserve better pay –– as well as acknowledgement for their signature offerings, much like wines are attributed to their winery.

During these workshops, he also weaves in snippets of his own story: how he went from a tech startup boss reviewing cafes as a hobby, to a full-time advocate for the industry and its sustainability.

For every kilogram of beans –– which can produce 44 cups of coffee –– farmers get about US$2-3, he says, adding that this is what many living in major cities like Hong Kong are rarely aware of.

“We won’t have enough land to [grow coffee at scale], but at least after going through this workshop and exercise, they will be more connected to the origin,” he said.

And Lam has seen some changes in people who attended his sessions.

“Usually, they will finish the cup,” he said. Afterwards, “they are probably more willing to pay a little bit more.”

Chris Lau, CNN