Carlos a. Moreno
sao Felix do Xingu ( Brazil), 29 mar ( EFE).- the cacao, native to the Amazon and that prospered in other Brazilian lands, has been reintroduced in this jungle region by farmers interested in improving their income and reforest devastated areas.
The plant that gives the fruit that produces chocolate grows easily in the jungle and provides a high financial benefit, reason by which has become an alternative for producers which soon destroyed the Amazon to increase grasslands for livestock.
“Saw that the livestock was not viable because we had to burn more forest to maintain the production.” “Cocoa offers us today one income greater than the cattle”, told Efe Altamiro Pereira Lorenzo, who ten years ago planted 3,000 plants in cocoa on its property of 62 hectares in the municipality of Sao Felix do Xingu, Pará State.
The replacement of grass by cocoa has been quick in Sao Felix, which besides having more cattle herd in the country, with two million head of cattle, is considered the greatest destroyer Amazon by have devastated 10.110 square kilometers of jungle in the past ten years.
Production of cocoa in Sao Felix spent 350 tonnes in 2005 to 1,500 tonnes in 2010, according to official data, credited to the municipality as the second largest producer in the country.
Other municipalities have followed the same path and Pará has established itself as one of the largest producers with a harvest last year was 63.739 tonnes, equivalent to 25.7 per cent of the national total.
First stays Bay, State of the Northeast, with 154.634 tons (62.3% of national production).
In addition to being a native plant, cocoa grows in the shade, reason by which farmers planted it in the midst of typical trees of the Amazon, such as mahogany, which guarantees the preservation of the jungle.
“conditions of soil and climate in the Amazon are suitable for cocoa”. “Studies indicate that crops closer to the line of the Ecuador produce cocoa with the features most appreciated by industry”, says a study by the Institute of man and the environment of Amazonia (Imazon), an organization which leads projects for sustainable development in the region.
Imazon launched a project to certify sustainable cocoa production of partners of the alternative cooperative of the small rural producers and urban of São Félix (Cappru).
“The Amazon produces basically raw materials from the forest.” “Have in Sao Felix one of the more organized cooperatives of producers of cacao (Cappru) led us to think about a project to improve the production and adding value”, explained to Efe Mireya Sandrini, Director of the Fundo Vale, entity sponsored by companies such as the Vale mining and finances the project of Imazon.
According to the President of the Cappru, Iron eternal Faria, the cooperative production went from 400 to 940 tonnes between 1997 and 2011, and almost all is sold to the multinational Delfi.
For the Cappru, the biggest advantage of cocoa in the Amazon is its low cost of production, since not spent anything nor chemical fertilizers to pest attack as the “Witch’s broom”, it decimated the plantations of Bay.
However, cocoa attracts the monkeys, who come to eat half the production in some places.
Producers initially them scurry shot, “but an expert farmer taught us a better technique: untar it spicy fruits reach the monkeys.” “Never again appear,” says Faria.
According to Francisco Fonseca, Coordinator of sustainable production of the organization The Nature Conservancy (TNC) in the Amazon region, in Sao Felix can be planted up to 50,000 hectares with cacao.
“the limit isn’t the area but the quantity of seeds”, says Fonseca to explain that the country is only available 1.5 million seed quality and resistant to plagues.
Fonseca added that the multinational Cargill, largest buyer of cocoa in Brazil is interested in providing funding and technical assistance to farmers in Sao Felix to change that will sell its production exclusively. EFE
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