Looking to the Future in Bella Vista
(Link to Dairy Processing Farm Project Description)
A Dairy Processing Farm Presents Economic Opportunities
This is a tremendous dream come true for me. If we hadn’t invested so much time in this project, this plant would never be here.
On September 25th, 2005 Justo Aguilar Tarque, the president of the Association of Milk Producers of Alto Beni (Asociación de Productores Lacteos Alto Beni, or APROLAB in Spanish), took a quick break from learning how to manufacture and package yoghurt to show off the plant.
Stainless-steel processing equipment necessary for the hygienic manufacturing and packaging of dairy derivatives filled the room. A 600 liter vat for pasteurizing milk and processing cheese sat ready. The members of APROLAB examined a bottling machine to package yoghurt into plastic satchels that are popular in Bolivia as a frozen snack. In a small room around the corner a quality-control laboratory tests the incoming milk and the outgoing products. The APROLAB members gathered here listened closely as ACDI/VOCA extensionist, Neil Henry Quiroz, explained the process of making yoghurt. One week later, APROLAB produced its first batch of cheese, which it sold at the FEXPOART fair in La Paz, and its first lot of yoghurt satchels, which it sold locally.
This small factory, constructed by ACDI/VOCA as part of the Yungas Community Alternative Development Fund (YCADF), funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development in Bolivia, presents an attractive economic opportunity for the residents of Bella Vista. Situated minutes from a checkpoint on the main road through the Yungas, these residents are accustomed to travelers stopping to rest at the roadside eateries. They hope to take advantage of this situation to sell their products to these passing travellers, and also to open markets in nearby Caranavi and possibly even in La Paz.
The members of APROLAB are not strangers to the dairy industry – the majority have been selling homemade cheeses to intermediaries who transport them to markets in La Paz for years. However, within that system, the producers find that they cannot even cover the real cost of manufacturing, let alone make a profit. With new facilities and training in the production of high-quality dairy derivatives, they will be able to sell products locally at prices that compete with imported products and reflect the true costs of their work.
In addition to the training provided by Quiroz in management of the cheese plant, the members of APROLAB have received training by ACDI/VOCA volunteer consultant, Daniel K. Miller, Ph.D. on cattle-herd health. Training from both of these sources has helped APROLAB develop the skills needed to manage each link along the commodity chain, from production to marketing. Future training will focus on association management, business skills development, accounting, sales and marketing.
Combined, the plant, the equipment and the training provided by the YCADF, will allow APROLAB to manufacture and package products with a higher value and market these products themselves. There are still challenges ahead for the association, as there are for any growing organization, but the members of APROLAB are excited to face them. As they do, they will build on the successes that they have achieved since the day Aguilar commented, We are ready to produce our very first products here, and sell them locally…. They will be products of the highest quality.
