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Go Green - Organic Industry Prospers during Pandemic. TaiwanICDF and Guatemala Host First Organic Farming Virtual Conference
The organic agriculture industry in Guatemala has been expanding. About 35,000 farmers have invested in organic cultivation; the organic cultivation area has reached 200,000 hectares; and the annual output of organic crops has exceeded 210,000 metric tons, with coffee, fruits and vegetables being the main exports. In order to expand organic agricultural production, the TaiwanICDF has implemented the Project for the Strengthening of Marketing Capacity in Family Farming (Guatemala). The project aims to promote the production and marketing of organic fruits, vegetables and coffee, and strengthen local agricultural production and friendly farming to ensure food security and sustainable use of land. The Taiwan Technical Mission and the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock of Guatemala jointly held the first annual organic agriculture virtual conference on September 7-10, 2020.
This conference included specialists from the German Corporation for International Cooperation (GIZ), Inter-American Commission for Organic Agriculture (CIAO), Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) and Spanish organic producer association Ecovalia. H.E. Li-Cheng Cheng, ambassador of the Republic of China (Taiwan) to Guatemala, gave opening remarks and shared the fruitful agricultural technical cooperation achievements from Taiwan and Guatemala. Dr. Chang-Hui Shen, chair of the Biology Department of the City University of New York, gave keynotes on "Application of Soil Microbes in Organic Agriculture" and "The Status and Trends of Global Organic Agricultural Development."
According to Guatemalan Vice Minister of Agricultural Health and Regulations Víctor Hugo Guzmán Silva, organic agriculture has created more than 100,000 jobs in the country, and demand for organic produce has annually increased as the economy grows. The annual growth of organic coffee exports in Guatemala reached 15 percent, showing that the organic industry has great development potential. The TaiwanICDF together with the Taiwan Technical Mission will continue to export our technology and experience to assist Guatemala in promoting organic agriculture.
More than 20,000 participants joined the four-day event and shared their ideas and opinions on Facebook and Twitter, sparking fruitful discussions on organic farming and future development issues.
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- Update: 2020/11/04
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