SCA Dubai Decision Brews Controversy
The Canadian chapter of the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) announced it will not participate in SCA sanctioned competitions scheduled in February and September 2018 in Dubai, aligning with the executive council of the Barista Guild of America. Paul Katzeff, founder of California-based Thanksgiving Coffee and a former SCAA president, denounced SCA’s decision. Sprudge promptly quit SCA in anger, abruptly departing the World Barista Championship in Seoul and suspending future coverage of SCA-sponsored events.
All cited concerns about laws in the United Arab Emirates’ against the LGBTQ communities.
The controversy began in September when World Coffee Events, the competitions arm of SCA, announced that four of its events would take place in Dubai. These include the Cezve/Ibrik Championship, scheduled for February at Gulfood, and the World Cup Tasters Championship, the World Brewers Cup, and the World Coffee Roasting Championship at GulfHost next September.
The backlash was swift, “gay coffee professionals will have to measure the risk of detainment, harassment, and possible prison time in order to attend and participate in the SCA’s 2018 events in Dubai,” wrote Sprudge. A chorus of members echoed their concerns and SCA suspended the decision for further discussion.
Months later the organization announced the events would take place as scheduled and that a “deferred candidacy policy” had been approved for eligible World Coffee Events entrants who cannot attend international competitions based on laws, natural calamities, religious, or gender restrictions in a host country.
If a national champion cannot attend an international event the champion can request to compete in the event a year later, according to the policy. SCA wrote that the resolution is designed to acknowledge and respect a competitor’s inability to travel to a country while enabling them to keep their hard-earned opportunity to compete.
Leadership of the Barista Guild announced that “simply and respectfully put, we are shocked and oppose this solution. We feel strongly that the lack of transparency around how these decisions were made, as well as how they were communicated, have both been significant disservices to our membership.” The guild executive council said baristas make up 35% of SCA’s global membership “and you have the power to create change within it.”
The Canadian chapter of SCA said it could not support the deferment policy and would not send Canadian competitors to any events in Dubai. “We cannot, in good conscience, ask our members to choose between compromising their safety, disclosing unnecessarily, not competing in the first place, or any of the other options this policy might require,” SCA Canada said in the announcement.
Sprudge: “We could shed thousands of words on why, exactly, this [deferment] policy is [bull****], but go and talk to any gay or queer person and they’ll tell you: formal outing in the name of bureaucratic authorization is wildly insensitive, untenable, and unacceptable. This is a direct affront to queer, trans, and allied coffee professionals across the planet, and it now the formal policy of SCA.”
In mid-November, SCA sent an email notice stating: “We want to be clear that the policy document is still being written, it is not yet defined in detail, and we are open to discussion and suggestions.”
A series of meetings were scheduled in major cities in the US and UK “to consider all viewpoints as we begin working on the new vetting process for future events, reads the advisory.