Organic Food in Cuenca

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Monday, 8th March 2010


Hola Everyone,

This article is the first of a series on health & medical in Cuenca.

• Organic food production
• Hospital de Rio (Cuenca's newest hospital)
• Medical insurance

Last week we went on a tour of the local cooperative here in Cuenca where a large percentage of our organic vegetables are grown. So to refresh your memories, I want to again show you the parcel of organic food that we purchased a couple of weeks ago. This was from a quick 10 minute walk across the river to our local organic market. The cost of the parcel shown below was only $11.11.

This store is owned and managed by the cooperative.  There are several of these stores in the Azuay Province (Cuenca in the capital) and also in the Guayas Province (Guayaquil is the capital).

In addition, the coop owns and operates the organic farm in Cuenca that supplies the stores, and it also purchases organic produce from other local farmers. The coop states that over 50% of their produce is sold to restaurants. You can probably find out which restaurants these are – if you want to eat more healthy  food when you dine out.

A credit society is also owned by the coop – for receiving deposits as well as financing local farmers. The coop will soon be issuing debit cards and ATM’s that will be able to take Visa Cards, Mastercards, etc.

A few weeks prior to our food shopping trip to the organic shop, we opened a savings account with the coop’s  deposit facility. They offer a more convenient automatic system compared with the normal banks for the payment of utility accounts (power, etc). In addition, the coops interest rates on deposits are much higher than other banks. We heard that the interest rate paid on deposits is as high as 12%.

As a quick aside, we are quite familiar with the operations of a former cooperative in Western Australia. This coop, Wesfarmers, is now a very successful West Australian company which began as a farmer’s cooperative in 1914. If you are interested in reading about how “big oaks can grow from little acorns”, read about the Wesfarmers story (http://www.wesfarmers.com.au/about-us/company-history.html). Observe how a small farmers coop has grown into a large corporation. This particular cooperative, and especially after conversion to a public company in the 1980’s, has emerged as Australia’s largest employer (200,000). It now has about 400,000 shareholders and owns many major investments in mining, supermarkets, department stores, hardware & building products, insurance, chemicals & fertilizers, and industrial and safety products. The company is now capitalized at more than US$25 Billion. Maybe Cuenca’s cooperative could grow into a similar success story????

This photo below shows the current head office of Coopera Ltda. This office is sited about 15 minutes (by car) from the center of Cuenca. It is very close to the coop’s organic farm.

And these photos below show a billboard and entrance to the packing and cold storage building which is about a 5 minute walk from the head office. The dispatch and receivals areas, and farm, is at the rear of this building. We were so impressed with this local food production facility, that we plan to organize regular tours to show locals and visitors first-hand what is available in Cuenca. The managers of the cooperative are very keen for us to show their facility to foreigners, as well as any local Ecuadorians who are interested. It is in everyone’s interest to promote the production and marketing of healthy food.

Just inside the entrance is an area where various organic condiments are made and packaged.

You can see here the various vegetables being prepared for delivery to the stores.



Below you can glance over many photographs of the various vegetables being grown. No chemicals or artificial fertilizers are used on the farm. In some garden beds, you will notice that “companion planting” practices are used. This is where natural insect repelling and nitrogen fixing crops (and other beneficial plants) are grown immediately next to lettuces etc. Crops are rotated between different beds to minimize any risks of damage from soil-born pathogens. Fresh organic material is also continually bought in to make new beds and freshen used ones.

You will even notice that watermelons and rockmelons (cantaloupe) are grown in these covered farming area (see last two photos in this Newsletter). These are normally grown on the coast here – in warmer climates. The covered areas Cuenca make the temperatures warm enough to grow these plants that are typically grown in mild to warm climates.

This shows the dispatch and receivals area. Local organic farm produce is purchased to
top-up local production.

Just glance through the photos below to see the lush greenery of the organic food production, and as they say, a picture says a thousand words.  I am sure you can almost smell the different aroma's as you glance through.

Chao for now
Dixie



























 

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