Every year, Colombia’s Agriculture Society (SAC for its Spanish initials) organizes the Colombian National Agriculture and Livestock Congress (CAN). Its 39th version took place in Bogotá, Colombia in November 2019 and was co-organized with members of SAC and the Colombian Government. President Iván Duque Márquez and several of his Cabinet Ministers, including Mr. Andrés Valencia Pinzón, the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development participated in the academic agenda.
In this version of the CAN, key topics were laid out as priorities for the development of Colombian agriculture including: the Government’s commitments to transform the Colombian countryside, new agritech, food trends, international commerce, the fight against illegality, legal security and guarantees, and customer-centered marketing, among others.
All of these issues are profoundly aligned with our strategic vision and purposes at ALO&Partners and are the reasons why we participated in this congress, where we presented xFarm, an Italian agritech startup as our strategic and technological ally. With xFarm, we have evidenced the potential of agritech to dynamize agriculture, and showcased technology such as: climate stations, ground sensors, and a software and App that integrates data in a digital ecosystem.
This technology has already been successfully proven in corn and wine crops in Italy and Europe, and is currently being piloted for coffee crops in Mesetas, Meta with the Tierra Colombia Project that ALO&Partners co-manages with the non-profit Makaia, under the leadership of the Fondazione Giuseppe e Pericle Lavazza Onlus and with the technological support of Microsoft’s Airband Initiative. This Project is part of the Coffee 5.0: Technology Transformation Model,which seeks to empower farmers, improve their productivity and quality of life through the adoption and embracing of technological tools, skills and knowledge.
At the CAN, ALO&Partners, xFarm, and Makaia engaged in conversations with companies in a wide array of agro-industries (banana, potato, palm oil, livestock, cocoa) with the purpose of identifying new opportunities to replicate the Model in other crops in addition to coffee. Likewise, strategic meetings were held with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to explore alliances and ways in which this Model can contribute towards the design and implementation of innovative public policy for Colombian agriculture.
At ALO&Partners we are convinced that new technological scenarios and innovative public policy efforts can benefit tremendously from the learnings, experiences and best practices of the Coffee 5.0 Model, generating sustainable impact in diverse sectors of Colombian agriculture.