El Salvador

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goal of collection center is to allow the producers to reach the export requirements to other countries. (Diaz, 2014). The manager of the association, Hugo Varela, stated “the association assets have grown from L200,000 (around US$8,695 [Exchange rate 23 USD/L]) to more than L5 million (aroundUS$220,000), in part due to the support of the Comrural project” (Comrural, 2015). To the extent that the cooperative also bought its own delivery truck.

The Taiwanese guava provided employment to 600 families in Comayagua and generates L20 million annually (Approx. US$870,000) (La tribuna, 2017). By 2014, around 30 shipments had been made to El Salvador. The price is around US$8 to US$10 for a box of 25 pounds of medium size. (Diaz, 2014). Before the project, farmers didn’t have employment, later,the Taiwanese guava provided employment to 600 families in Comayagua. The cooperative objective has been to eliminate the intermediary in order to obtain a better price for the crop (Interview manager association, appendix F).

One problem the association encountered after Taiwan’s technicians left, is the supply of suitable agricultural products that before were provided by Taiwan’s technicians such as: the plastic bag that is used to cover the guava. No information was given to the association on where they should continue to purchase them. The general manager mentioned that the association is extremely grateful for Taiwan’s technical assistance but suggested that the technicians be more in contact with the local farmers.

He believes that Taiwan’s is really respectful of negotiated terms with the government and since they negotiate government to government, their discussions and assistance is also done that way. However, inside the Ministry of Agriculture of Honduras, there’s too much bureaucracy and the information or technology is not passed down to local farmers (Interview Comayagua, 2017).

4.4 El Salvador

The situation of Guava is very different in El Salvador than in Costa Rica and Honduras. No guava cooperatives were formed but instead the technical mission was carried out through an institute called Center of Agricultural and Forestry Technology [Centro de Tecnologia Agropecuaria y Forestal] (CENTA) and they were in charge of transferring the seedlings and training to the local farmers.

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Description of Taiwan ICDF project

Little information is known on the guava project in El Salvador. No information is available on the exact locations that the projects were carried out as neither Taiwan ICDF, CENTA or MAG wanted to disclose or provide this information. However, since the year 2002, Taiwan has been training CENTA specialists on the performance of seedling evaluation and propagation. That same year, Taiwan established a seedling propagation area in CENTA facilities, improved the cultivation of guava and provided training to technicians for the Department of Agriculture and Livestock in El Salvador (MAG El Salvador)(Taiwan ICDF, 2002,p.123). From an interview carried out with the person in-charge of CENTA in Nueva Concepcion, he claimed that in 2002 and 2003 Taiwan’s technical mission had a project in the region which constituted of promotion and demonstration in small parcels of the production of guava. Only a few farmers, that believed the project was sustainable, joined and then through CENTA and Taiwan’s technical mission started to provide training and consulting in the technical and production of guava. From only 1 mz. of guava in 2002 Nueva Concepcion’s production has expanded to 140mz.

In 2008, Taiwan developed a multicenter Las Doscientas in CENTA’s facilities, the main objective was to be a model of operation for local farmers. This center provides training to CENTA’s employees which would later transfer that knowledge to locals’ farmers. In addition, the multicenter provides farmers with planting assistance, produce high quality seedlings at a lower price than local market (Noticias de Taiwan, 2015), produce organic compost and provide field demonstrations. (Taiwan ICDF, n.d1). In March, 2009 CENTA in cooperation with Taiwan’s technical mission inaugurated a horticultural center. The center cultivates many different types of Taiwanese fruits and local fruits: Taiwanese guava, wax apple, dragon fruit, yellow watermelon, papaya, passion fruit, etc. This represents new alternatives for local farmers (El Pais, 2014).

From 2008 to 2010, Taiwan ICDF projects in El Salvador changed from only being a seedling model plant to providing farmers with sales training, providing loans, seedlings and technical assistance. During the year 2008 to 2012, Taiwan in Multicenter Las Doscientas completed the construction of educational classroom, built a seedling and greenhouse center, fertilizing centers and package centers. From 2011 to 2013, Taiwan’s assistance focused on improving the center IT system and training the

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technicians. In 2013, the multicenter was given back to the local government for its continuation. (Taiwan ICDF, n.d1).

Some of the observations made in Taiwan ICDF (n.d.1) about the general farmers’ situation in El Salvador, was that the lack land ownership and the necessity to lease or work on someone’s land, the high price of transportation and agricultural supplies in the country, the bad state of land which would require substantial amount of fertilizers to be fertile. In a second report, Taiwan mentioned another problem was that farmers didn’t leave close to each other which makes it hard to establish cooperatives or organization (Taiwan ICDF, n.d.2).

General Results

Production of guava has increased in El Salvador (Please refer to Table 4.2).

All production of guava is consumed nationally. The largest supermarket, Super Selectos currently buys all its guava locally. This has led to a decrease of imports from neighboring countries and no export of guava exists in El Salvador at the moment, as per SIECA statistics records.

Year Production Area (Mz.)

Production (QQ.)

2015 360 72,559

2016 384 135,149

Table 4.2.Production of guava in El Salvador 2015-2016 Source: MAG El Salvador (2015, 2016)

In order to determine the imports of Guava, we have use the SAC customs classification-0804.50.20 and 0804.50.20, this includes guava and mangosteens.

Unfortunately, no custom tariff classification was found that only include guava.

(Please refer to figure 4.7). We can see that from year 2011 imports of guava were increasing reaching its peak in 2013 for 188,181kgs. Following that year, guava imports have decreased to 476.3Kg in 2016.

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Source: SIECA statistics

Unlike Honduras and Costa Rica, El Salvador did not see the creation of any guava farmers’ cooperative, at least that is selling its products in the largest supermarket chain in El Salvador and that it is known to the researcher. Nueva Concepcion, Chalatenango has 37% of guava production land in El Salvador (Produces 140 mz. out of 384 mz. at national level). Currently, there are 32 producers in that region with 90mz producing guava and140 mz planted. Nueva Concepcion produces 25,000lb/mz/year which is an approximate production of 2,250,000lb/ year. The farmers in this area are grouped into a larger association that produces rice, guava, pasture for livestock and tilapia. There are plans by MAG El Salvador to establish a collection center for this association but the estimated date is unknown. The person in charge of CENTA Nueva Concepcion, who is also a guava producer claimed that the biggest problem they have is that they are not grouped as a cooperative. Instead, each of the farmers individually sells their crops. Intermediaries go pick up the crop to the plantations, they pay at the moment and they take it to the traditional market in San Salvador and La Tiendona to be sold. He claimed that no training has ever been received in the commercialization aspect of guava only on the production. He also stated that “It was due to Taiwan’s technical mission and CENTA that we have guava, we were the pioneers at national level to produce the guava. Some other fruits were also introduced as the wax apple and jujube and due to the lack of marketing, wax apple and jujube haven’t been so

1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 Value(US$) Volume(Kgs)

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successful in the market.” This definitely differs from the projects in Honduras and Costa in which a group of farmers was only introduced one fruit.

It is unknown how technical assistance is provided to farmers through CENTA.

CENTA is an autonomous institution, whose primary purpose is to increase the production and productivity of the agricultural sector and forestry through the generation and transfer of technology to the small and medium producers in the country.

By 1997, this institution had 78 branches throughout the national territory and it was the only agricultural institution that was across the country (IICA, 1997). In spite of CENTA’s main objective and quantity of branches, in a National Committee of Family Agriculture [Comité Nacional de Agricultura Familiar] (CNAF) (2015) report declared that one of the problems farmers had faced before 2009 was that only 8% had ever and if they received training 70% was from any of three institutions in El Salvador: MAG El Salvador, CENTA and Institute for Agricultural Transformation [Instituto Salvadoreño de Transformacion Agraria] (ISTA). The farmers that received training had higher production than those that never received any training.

More research is required in the case of El Salvador to determine where and how the technical assistance was provided and what are the current results of those regions.

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CHAPTER 5 ANALYSIS ON TAIWAN’S AID IN