2024-08-07 02:18:46
The Municipal Administration of Isnos has already requested resources from the National Government on several occasions to improve the sugarcane production facilities and thus make them self-sustaining. A good initiative is to include in a single project the municipalities of Santa María, Saladoblanco, Pitalito and San Agustín, which also produce the sweetener.
There are around 4,000 people who depend on panela production in the municipality of Isnos.
Panela production
In this regard, José Alfredo Muñoz, mayor of the municipality of Isnos, said: “Our town is known as the ‘panela capital’, it is a product in which, thank God, a large number of people are associated, but few of them are exporting this merchandise to other countries.”
According to the official in this entity, there are more than 400 producers who have their establishments, but unfortunately only 20, who have been supported by the National Government, are those who comply with the technical standards to send panela abroad.
“If we look at the number of technically trained producers, we are far below the great need that exists in our region. Because we can produce much more panela, but it would affect the price, that is why the farmers are divided into two zones and each one produces in different periods. Every three days 5,000 bags of panela are produced, which is for the consumption of the region,” said the mayor.
And every 15 days, more than 5,000 packages of the sweetener are sent abroad.
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Good prices on sweetener
The official also indicated that at this time, thanks to the existing regulations, the Municipal Police, in charge of regulating the production of the sweetener, have been doing well, thanks to the help of the National Federation of Panela Producers ‘Fedepanela’.
“There is a good price because we have tried to ensure that producers respect the shifts. And we are seeking support for this type of entrepreneurs, “for example, the first, second and third phases have already been submitted in requesting resources from the national level to support the establishments, so that they are self-sustaining. And we are seeking to include in a single project the municipalities of Santa María, Saladoblanco, Pitalito and San Agustín, who also produce the sweetener,” said the president.
Currently, the cost of panela is $480,000, which is a good price for the producer, but if the price falls below $300,000, it generates losses for the people.
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They ask for government support
“And in order to improve production, we ask the National and Departmental Government to focus on this panela sector, and due to the demands of the market, which asks for a better product, but for this purpose, we must have good tools,” said the mayor.
And ‘Fedepanela’ has a schedule aimed at complying with the required health standards. “Permanent training is being done, but I have always said training or requirements, without support it is difficult to comply or improve,” said José Alfredo Muñoz.
“We need to become more technical. For example, there are now varieties of sugarcane that are much more profitable. We need to improve the transportation of this crop, as well as the sugar mills, because we still work as we did 100 years ago, as our ‘grandfathers’ started, with horses. That is why we are behind,” the official revealed.
Support received in 2023
In this sense, the panela producers from the municipalities of Isnos, Oporapa and San Agustín welcomed the technical team from the Government of Huila, which arrived with a significant supply of equipment and utensils intended to improve the production and handling processes of panela in accordance with the demands of the new markets, and in line with health regulations.
These deliveries are part of the project called “Strengthening the sugar cane transformation process for panela by providing productive assets to producers in the department of Huila”, financed with resources from the General Royalties System for more than $1.6 billion, which undoubtedly seeks to make panela producers in 14 nuclei, located in the municipalities of Isnos, San Agustín, Oporapa, Santa María, Gigante, Neiva and Palermo, more competitive.
Among the equipment and utensils delivered to these panela producer associations are high-performance mills or trapiches, Lister-type motors, pans or drums, pre-cleaning tanks, fire tube boilers, bottoms, honey pots, grills, juice conduction systems, fire passages, filter baskets, mixing systems, cooling tables, spray sieves, drawer washing tanks, heat-sealing guns, pallets, scales, among other elements.
Preferred sweetener
And due to its excellent characteristics as a natural sweetener, the panela produced in Huila continues to gain ground in international markets, and this is reflected in the new trade agreements reached between exporting companies and panela producers in the south of the department, making the Huila product found on the tables of diners in the United States and Europe.
In addition to the pulverized panela produced by the Apropanal Association of the municipality of Isnos, which began to be exported in 2021 with the support of the Government of Huila and Procolombia, another company in the region has reached a new bilateral agreement to send panela in a new form to Valencia, Spain.
This is the company from Inzeso, Panelas Don Julio, which after presenting various samples of the sweetener to international markets, has managed to close several businesses.
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Impact of this new trade agreement
Considering that panela is normally made in square or rectangular molds, this new presentation meant a great challenge for the company, which had already been assuming a new responsibility to deliver production on time, without neglecting other customers, which translates into increasing logistics capacities and operations.
However, this new demand for panela also represented a new opportunity for women and young people in the region, since in order to fulfill the delivery of these contingents of the product, a larger workforce is required, allowing the creation of 12 new jobs.
And there is another great advantage that benefits panela producers in the region, and that is that by selling these 19 tons of panela in international markets, it prevents the product from staying in the region, flooding local markets and generating a negative impact on the purchase prices of the sweetener.
Finally, panela is one of the most important agro-industries in the country, with production in 27 departments, generating nearly 278,000 direct jobs, 40 million daily wages a year and is the basis of the livelihood of 350,000 families in the different links of the chain. Panela is also a basic product in the family basket.
The impact of Expopanela is influential and significant, where social force unites different actors to promote the consumption and purchase of a product such as Colombian panela.