The Dutch government will contribute 4.331 million pesos to the banana sector, through a public-private partnership with Colombian authorities and fruit businessmen, which could be replicated in the coffee and floriculture sector.
Harman Idema, Mission Deputy Chief for the Dutch Embassy, who formalized the financial support in the initiative, which seeks to empower 685 small banana and plantain farmers, expressed the country's interest in similar programs in other agricultural activities.
The banana alliance
Banana traders like Banacol and Unibán, through their foundations Corbanacol and Fundaunibán (who signed the agreement with the governments of the Netherlands and Colombia), are committed to doubling the Dutch contribution and raise it to 8.663 million pesos. This, in order to implement a process of sustainable production practices, and competitiveness, through the overall improvement of the beneficiary families in Urabá, Chocó and the Magdalena.
"The program seeks to establish a plan for the market and civil society organizations to invest in supply chains that are socially, environmentally and economically sustainable," said Roberto Hoyos Ruiz, president of Augura, the group that will coordinate the project.
Laverde Felipe Restrepo, Corbanacol manager, said that the new agreement constitutes the second phase of a successful process that was implemented between 2006 and 2010. In this process, 8960 million pesos were invested,
benefiting 36,000 families and also becoming winner of the 2009 "Emprender Paz" awards. The United Nations presented this process as an example of meeting the millennium objectives, in Germany in 2010.
Source: Elcolombiano.com