Social Impact
At our company we support and motivate the conservation of native communities’ ancestral knowledge.
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Although the wild cacao has always been present in the culinary culture of the Amazonian inhabitants, they used to collect it only for their own consumption.
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Since our company was established, the importance of wild cacao has been magnified due to the huge impact on the family income of the Amazonian inhabitants. Thanks to the Wild Cacao gathering activity, the people living here have shifted from an annual income of 300 US dollars per family to 3000 in one year.
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In the areas where we operate among 800 families are involved in the activity and at the same time they act as guardians of the rainforest against the advance of the cattle-raising activity performed by wealthier families.
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We have opted for a gender policy to support female work looking forward to a more equitable distribution of the family income.
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Although the local people, as a matter of ancestral culture, know how to treat the cacao beans at the post-harvest stage, we periodically organize workshops and give them technical support with the ambition of linking their ancestral knowledge to academic knowledge.
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To do this, instead of hiring foreign technicians, we select a team of local people to get trained by specialists in other countries. This way we have created a net by skilled local people who spread the knowledge among their neighbors to perform the technically correct job.
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Economic Impact
“We can not generate development by only purchasing cacao beans, 3 months of harvest per year do not relieve poverty in the area”. (Marcela Baldiviezo CEO)
The economic activity performed by our company is sustainable in time and has a positive and direct impact on the economy of the Amazonian communities all the year round.
The policy of our company has, since the beginning, been to give added value to the natural resources and to transform it in a responsible way to offer high quality products elaborated at origin.
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This way, and only this way, it is possible to create stable jobs securing economic benefits for locals and for the people where our production site was established.
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Environmental Impact
The collection of wild cacao in the Amazon jungle is not harmful to the ecosystem. Our researches show that at least 50% of the existing wild cacao is consumed by the local fauna. As the bigger volume of this wild resource is located in forested areas, inaccessible for the human being, the animals´ consumption and transfer of fruits and consequent movement of the seeds generates new natural nurseries of wild cacao among other fruits and forestry species.
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Due to the perfect symbiosis of nature´s interaction it becomes practically impossible to determine with precision the size of the area containing wild cacao. As a result of the correct application of socioeconomic policies, the inhabitants of this area opt by collection methods instead of traditional agriculture, this way protecting their own habitat, the jungle, from deforestation.
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Another very important aspect in our wild activity is the water consumption. The rain, humidity level and soil conditions in the Amazon lowlands, permit enough moisture to grow thousands of biological species, among these the cacao pods. This is possible, almost magically, without using even a drop of fresh water from the reserves of the planet.
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In any kind of agricultural system, big volumes of fresh water are needed to irrigate the soils. We are deeply moved by promoting the wild cacao preservation, to care for the global fresh water reserves, and to feel honored to feel ourselves together with many local families as beneficiaries from the great generosity of Mother Nature.
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