According to Andres Rodriguez, the CEO of the Chilean Walnut Commission and of Chile Prunes, "Argentina's nut sector, which is in the process of constituting the association of dried fruits, is greatly interested in the success that the Chilean union has had in this sector and in the public-private work they have been developing for several years."
A few days ago, Rodriguez was a guest speaker at a conference organized by Mendoza's dried fruits cluster and Argentina's Ministry of Agricultural Industry.
In his presentation, which was called Public-private work for the development of the nut sector: Chile's experience, he spoke about the joint work between the Chilean processors and exporters of nuts, which together with public authorities, have achieved several objectives of representativeness, opening markets, marketing, product quality, information transfer and communication with the industry and major international stakeholders.
"Four companies left in 2009. Today there are 24 exporting companies on the committee that represents 80% of the industry and that, through a Joint Operating Agreement, brings together companies associated to the Chilean Walnut Commission and to Chilenut.
In addition, he said, "the major boost that the public sector and the association of producers of dried fruits, who saw an interesting possibility in exporting, was critical to the growth of dried fruit sector, especially for the nut sector, as it helped Chile become the second largest exporter of nuts worldwide, after the United States."
The meeting was held at the Center for Information and Communication of the National University of Cuyo (CICUNC). In addition to the meeting, they held several meetings with public authorities of the Ministry of Economy and ProMendoza to learn more about the union's experience and challenges of the sector in both nations.