The Government of Cauca, through the project Business Models for Social Innovation, held last weekend the 1st. Trout Associations Festival, in the municipality of Silvia, east of the department.

 

In this important meeting, which was attended by about 500 people, delegates from the Misak indigenous community, representative of the region's fish farmers, the project team Business Models for Social Innovation and marketers interested in acquiring the products and in establishing commercial links around the trout business.

 

Also present were teachers, researchers, students, journalists, artists and tourists from several municipalities of Cauca and Valle.

 

It should be noted that the initiative 'Alternatives for the Use of By-Products Derived from Fisheries Agroindustry', Altpez, is financed with resources from the Royalties General System, SGR and executed by the University of Cauca, the Regional Center for Productivity and Innovation of Cauca CREPIC and the Association Caucana de Piscicultores.

 

Altpez arose from the trout crops in the Cauca through which it promotes the use of fish by-products that are normally discarded.

 

José Luis Hoyos, Faculty of Agrarian Sciences professor and Altpez project coordinator, said that in Silvia there are currently more than 150 farms with productive potential and considerable economic development for the region "but a number of byproducts remain. We are talking about viscera in particular that are not used as it should be, so what we do is take these viscera, treat them and use them as a substitute raw material for fishmeal. "

 

In a new plant, with which it is expected to be ready towards the end of the year, this raw material will be used for developing food for smaller species; the approximate capacity is to produce one ton per hour.

 

"The food process plant will remain in the municipality of Silvia will be a site where we will be able to transfer all the developments that we make in the center, we will be able to take them to the productive sector, the challenge is for the plant to work, that the producers can appropriate this challenge in an appropriate way, that can be taken forward, for that the University of Cauca is still present," said Professor Hoyos.

 

In turn, Juan Carlos Maya Feijoó, Secretary of Economic Development and Competitiveness of Cauca, said that the idea is that, with the support of research and innovation, and to celebrate tangible results with the community, spaces such as the festival held in Silvia survive in time.

 

"This is an event that we are going to institutionalize from now on, is an event that involves the fish chain, especially a star product that is trout. Here, what the Government intends to do through the dependency to my position is to facilitate and make possible scenarios of commercial exchange, business exchange and community strengthening, "he said.

 

More information

 

Faculty of Agricultural Sciences

Phone: 8245976-78-79 - Ext. 101

Email: facagro@unicauca.edu.co