Colombia’s Agricultural Industry Moves towards Exports

Colombia’s agricultural sector has a promising future, particularly as it relates to organic produce and high-quality niche fruits. Given Colombia’s historic sociopolitical transition, large swaths of the national territory are suddenly becoming available for agricultural operations and the national government is collaborating with private enterprises in order to develop the agricultural industry. In this regard, President Juan Manuel Santos recently announced the launch of a US$21.4 million public-private initiative focused on boosting export oriented agricultural production amongst small and mid-sized farm operations. Furthermore, the targeted product categories are avocados, pineapples, mango, beef, and dairy, among other products.

Colombia’s Agricultural Industry Moves towards Exports

This “El Agro Exporta” national initiative brings together approximately 11.000 farmers from 200 Colombian municipalities and is geared primarily towards helping peripheral communities that have been particularly affected by the country’s history of conflict. Additionally, this initiative seeks to diversify Colombia’s international export market for agricultural products and take advantage of the country’s main Free Trade Agreements (FTAs), including with the United States, the European Union, the Pacific Alliance, and Mercosur, amongst others. Today, Colombia’s main agricultural exports are coffee, cut flowers, and bananas destined mainly towards markets of the Western Hemisphere, such as the United States, Panama, Ecuador, Peru, Mexico, and Brazil. Likewise, Europe as a whole accounts for 19% of Colombia’s overall exports.

However, with the “El Agro Exporta” national initiative, Colombia hopes to continue diversifying its agricultural offering with products like Hass avocados, whose exports towards the United States rose substantially from some US$107.000 in 2011 to US$55 million in 2016. Similarly, another major market that is slowly opening up to Colombia’s agricultural products is China. In fact, within China’s 2016 Policy Paper on Latin America and the Caribbean, agriculture is identified as one of six priorities for cooperation. Furthermore, China is explicitly interested in fostering trade and advancing food security between Asia and Latin America, particularly using technological innovation and providing technical training. In this regard, China’s current Five-Year Plan (2016-2020) has identified maximizing agricultural yields and ensuring a secure supply of essential food staples as some of the country’s priorities. Moreover, China’s current Plan emphasizes environmental protection as well as increasing the total amount of terrain devoted to agriculture and forestry.

Likewise, through Farmfolio’s initiatives in Colombia and Panama, our CEO Dax Cooke wants both international investors and the local economy to capitalize on agriculture while contributing to sustainable human and economic development. By creating a new and innovative asset class, Farmfolio’s Farmshare offerings contribute socially and economically to the Colombian and Latin American communities where they are settled by empowering them to grow and upgrade their entrepreneurial vision, while yielding profits for our investors. In this sense, Farmfolio’s investment model is unprecedented when it comes to foreign investment because it provides for innovative, sustainable, and responsible economic development in emerging markets.

(Read more about Fruit Logistica: A Staple of Fresh Fruit and Produce)