Visiting the Agro-entrepreneurship and Innovation Fair at UNAL is meeting the many agricultural products that represent the diversity that Colombia has. Whoever visits it will be able to taste the tropical panela from Guaduas, the coffee from the Peñón, the honey from Ubaque; the blueberry yogurt and wine produced in Tabio; Cachipay bread, which contains sacha inchi, oil and butter; sugar-free jam, and orellana mushrooms.
One of the most striking examples is Cortázar Coffee, a space created by University students who, intrigued by the processes around coffee and its production chain, decided to become an efficient and fair intermediary with coffee growers to promote the “ specialty market”, which seeks to promote the grain as a tool for producers to obtain greater benefits from their crops and sales.
Felipe Ramírez, a member of the project, points out that “the idea we have is to promote responsible consumption and the coffee culture in Colombia, because all the time we take for granted the way these products reach our homes, but there is no awareness that this is an iconic product that is produced in 23 of the 32 departments in the country, and that it needs a much more efficient distribution network.”
“We have managed to be the official representatives of the Korean company Glowbeans, which sells a series of water distributors, which are small instruments that serve to better distribute water in drip methods during coffee production.
During the fair there are also project planning workshops, entrepreneurship and innovation talks and consultancies with assistance and support for initiatives in the agricultural sector, an opportunity for students to broaden their perspective, land their ventures and thus put into practice the knowledge acquired.
Another very attractive example is the Quibee – Honey route, an initiative of UNAL students in the municipality of Quipile (Cundinamarca), which brings an innovative product using pollen, honey and lulo to create a mixture used by athletes such as the Colombian Judo Team in their training. There are also jars with the fusion between honey and products such as passion fruit, cinnamon or jalapeño.
A key example of entrepreneurship is the UNAL’s Seedbed for Research in Cannabis and Derivatives (SICAD), which is responsible for tropicalizing the plants, which means that they adapt seeds brought from North America to the environmental conditions of Colombia such as those of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, to generate ointments and drops, free of psychotropics such as tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). They currently have around 20 plants, which they mix with some such as tobacco or eucalyptus to reduce their THC concentration.
David Salamanca, a member of the nursery, explains that the process is carried out by means of the hydroponics method, which consists in the plants not being grown in the soil or on the ground, but rather in a kind of tubes filled with water that are mixed with minerals necessary for its growth, such as nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, among others.
Opportunities to grow and innovate
In addition to the market with various UNAL initiatives, there are also ventures from the Government of Cundinamarca and the Botanical Garden, among which it is worth mentioning the autonomous sensor company EnVIT, which is responsible for measuring environmental variables (light, temperature and relative humidity) and soil parameters (humidity, pH, electrical conductivity, among others).
They also advance a series of talks around topics such as entrepreneurship in the agricultural sector, where experts and connoisseurs of the subject are invited to speak and contextualize the attendees about what is being done and the opportunities that exist.
In the first stage of the fair, called “Opportunities in the entrepreneurship and innovation ecosystem”, Professor Diego Romero, member of the Biogenesis “Biosciences and Agribusiness” research group of UNAL, was present; Professor Aida Fúquene, who has been coordinating the University’s Knowledge Transfer Team for more than 7 years; and Catalina Mahecha, director of Ecosystems of the National Government’s Agency for Entrepreneurship and Innovation (iNNpulsa).
The experts explained the importance that this event has had for the students, since it has allowed them to be in project planning workshops, entrepreneurship and innovation talks, courses on this subject; and, something very important, to have consultancies with assistance and accompaniment to initiatives in the agricultural sector. The Fair will be held until October 20, with the same offer of enterprises and with new conferences on agricultural planning and production chains of natural rubber in the industry.
