Colombia seeks Building Second Freeze-Dried Plant; Reindustrialization of Coffee: Minister
Colombia seeks Building Second Freeze-Dried Plant; Reindustrialization of Coffee: Minister
Coffee Network (Bogota) -Colombia plans to build a second freeze-dried coffee plant in the country’s largest coffee-producing department in a public-private partnership that seeks to re industrialize the coffee sector, Jhenifer Mojica, minister of agriculture said.
The plant will be located in the Huila department, the country’s largest coffee-producing province in the municipality of Pitalito. The investment of the plant will be public-private partnership in association with coffee growers, Mojica told reporters on the sidelines of the 92 annual coffee growers congress.
The administration of Colombia’s first leftist president Gustavo Petro aims to reindustrialize the coffee sector, and as part of such industrialization the freeze-dried plant is an example of such industrialization.
“We want to add value to coffee not only exporting coffee in bags, “ she noted.
In other news, the Petro administration also seeks to expand the coffee plantations to about 1 million hectares by end of his administration in 2026, up from around 850,000 hectares now. Such expansion will also be financed with public-public funds.
“Coffee growers today have 2 million hectares of which around 850,000 hectares are producing beans. We want them to expand the coffee hectares to improve the revenues of coffee families,” she said.
“We cannot grow coffee as we want without growing the organization capacity and until we strengthen the cooperative association,” she noted.
The Ministry will also support the production of specialized beans.
The agriculture ministry allocated Ps35 billion Colombian pesos ($8.8 million) to renovate coffee plants. According to Mojica, the funds have already been allocated. It is estimated that this investment will benefit around 17,500 small coffee growers in the country for the renewal of 7,800 hectares of coffee crops. Under this scenario, it is expected that in the next three years the production will go from five to twelve loads per hectare.
Yesterday, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, announced that the second phase of the Access to Agricultural Inputs Fund which will provide financial aid to 120,000 small producers who purchase inputs in any of the 10,000 authorized commercial establishments to mitigate the effects of El Niño weather phenomenon.
The Ministry will also announce a loan to support the Zoca, a method, in which the tree is cut at an approximate height of 30 cm above the floor.
Robusta
The Petro administration will support the production of Robusta. Robusta will be promoted in areas hit by the 60-year old conflict, including the areas in the Colombia’s Pacific. The government’s agricultural research institute-Agrosavia is carrying out tests to produce Robusta beans in the Pacific town of Tumaco, humid areas in the Caribbean and the Llanos Foothills.
“We already know how it is working in the Pacific,” Mojica noted. “We have already started the first Robusta alliances with companies that have already been showing results. This is a line that can help us gain land in terms of crop replacement,” she noted. Such companies include Nestle among others.
Agrosavia has already imported the seeds of Robusta, and the seedlings are being reproduced, Gustavo Gomez, director of the coffee exporters association, has said.
The cup of Robusta beans produced in Tumaco is yielding a much higher quality of coffee than those of Brazil or Vietnam, Gomez noted.
Colombia should take advantage of increased demand and prices for Robusta coffee unlike Arabica beans to begin commercial production of Robusta , the president of the board of the coffee exporters association, Santiago Pinzon, said at the opening ceremony of the 87th coffee exporters association summit (Asoexport).
The reduction in Arabica prices and an increase of global Robusta prices highlights the importance of Agrosavia-- the agricultural research institute--, to move forward with the commercial production of Robusta beans.
Colombia does not produce Robusta, but the states of Meta, Casanare, Vichada, Nariño and Arauca have a high potential to produce Robusta coffee, which allows mechanized harvesting as they are located on flat lands. Those states produce marginally Arabica beans on the slopes of its mountains.
By Diana Delgado
