Coffee Talk

Rohan Marley, son of legendary musician Bob Marley, is coming to Halifax.

The 42-year-old founder of Jamaica’s Marley Coffee, is scheduled to speak at SMU’s Sobey School of Business on Wednesday, June 11 at 11 a.m.

The free presentation will be open to the public and able to accommodate 150 people.

The lecture will focus on environmental sustainability, entrepreneurship, as well as the WaterWise coffee initiative.

Rohan, a former football star who played alongside Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson at the University of Miami, and who later joined the Ottawa Rough Riders, co-founded his namesake coffee brand (with friend Shane Whittle) in 2007 – eight years after he purchased 52 acres of land in Jamaica’s Blue Mountains, one of the most valuable coffee-producing regions in the world.

Since 2011, Marley Coffee has been publically traded under the name Jammin Java Corp (JAMN), with its current headquarters located in Denver, Colorado.

Last month, it was announced that Marley Coffee had entered into a deal with Ontario-based Mother Parker’s Tea & Coffee, by which North America’s largest roaster would provide Rohan’s enterprise with up to $8.25 million in funding.

The WaterWise initiative, a program dedicated to improving living conditions and water-filtration systems in Ethiopa’s coffee bean-rich Sidamo area, is Mother Parker’s leading environmental sustainability project. According to an April 30^th press release, Rohan, whose company also sources beans from that same region, will serve as the initiative’s lead ambassador.

Photo: Rohan Marley and his former love, Grammy Award-winning singer Lauryn Hill. The couple have five children.