Workers arrested at coffee school
Boss and two foreigners accused over illegal employment as industry points to lack of local experts to teach how to make exotic coffees
Hongkongers can't get enough of their speciality coffees - but trouble is brewing when it comes to training baristas, with immigration officers moving in on one of the city's few certified coffee-making schools.
Two men from Latin America and their local employer are understood to have been arrested on Saturday at the Cheung Sha Wan premises of Coffee Pro. The Immigration Department confirmed the arrests but did not identify the employer.
The head of the Professional Coffee Association, a local group representing the industry, says the arrests are a sign of the lack of local teachers qualified to make the kinds of exotic coffees served at the city's emerging generation of high-end cafes.
The two foreign men, one from Brazil and the other from El Salvador, are in their 30s and 40s and are understood to have entered the city as visitors the week before their arrest.
The pair were held for breaching their conditions of stay, while their employer, who was not named, was suspected of employing illegal workers, a department spokesman said.
Coffee Pro staff yesterday confirmed to the South China Morning Post that immigration officers were at their Castle Peak Road office on Saturday.
The school's operator Raymond Tong was out teaching coffee-making courses elsewhere, an employee said. Tong did not respond to repeated requests for an interview.