There are many fruits in the national biodiversity that have been studied but not exploited. The time has come for cacay, a product with great potential uses, and two paisas are behind its commercialization.
There is the Brazilian coquito, the Peruvian sacha inchi, the Australian macadamia, and soon the world will know the Colombian cacay, a jewel in the agrarian crown, which is basically a nut that has been studied for 60 years, but which no one had dared to explore, exploit and market. It was the time of President Alfonso López Michelsen, between 1974 and 1978, when at a palm congress held by the sector’s industrialists, the president spoke of the solution for oil production in the tropics being this fruit, which grew in the Amazon and Orinoquia regions. But no one listened to him and only the peasants and indigenous people continued to use the plant for food and to extract an oil capable of healing burns and irritations.
Camilo and Alberto Jaramillo, twin brothers, found out about this story and inquired about the advantages of cacay and the studies that existed on this nut that no one had tried to mass-market: “Why hasn’t anyone done this so well? They researched and found that people who had worked with the product in the past “were either very scientific, or very romantic, but there was no commercial view of the subject.”
Then they were faced with the opportunity of a lifetime with many adversities: a tree that takes between seven and eight years to bear fruit, which is able to produce its nuts (there are three in a single shell), that has both females and males (but only the former bring the product) and whose wild harvest is low. It was not economically viable to generate large-scale production, necessary to supply the large number of customers it could have, since it was a new nut on the market, coming out of the Amazon rainforest, in addition to the well-known almonds, pistachios, hazelnuts or macadamias.
But the twins from Manizales, who specialize in marketing, did not stop and began their entrepreneurial career in 2006, when they set themselves the task of researching this tree, whose wild harvest is shared with Peru, Venezuela, Ecuador and Brazil (countries with Amazon rainforest), and found that there was a lot of commercial uncertainty on the agricultural side: little production, with a long time to see results. “So the biggest technological development we have done is to domesticate the species, to graft it,” says Camilo, who says that they began applied research work with grafters and, after a year and a half of trial and error, they were able to establish a three-year production, which accelerated yields and guaranteed a greater number of productive females.
From that moment on, they began to grow nurseries and promote crops. All studies, product development and the implementation of their own machinery to transform the cacay was done with the purchase of wild harvests in Meta, Guaviare, Caquetá and Putumayo. This is how they began to extract oil and obtain nuts that could be sold on the national and world markets.
And the miracle appeared: a 100% natural anti-aging oil, rich in vitamins E and F and retinol, which in the words of Alberto Jaramillo “nourishes, softens and repairs damaged skin and hair”. Extracting this liquid leaves a flour “rich in proteins, minerals, omegas and fiber, ideal as a dietary supplement”. It is used to prepare almond milk, which serves as a substitute for milk obtained from animals. Meanwhile, the nuts are used in preparations coated with caramel, chocolate, salt, spices or herbs.
These multiple uses of the cacay have made it known in many communities as the “vegetable cow”, because apart from the milk that can be extracted from its fruit, the nuts (of a large size, compared to those known in the market), are rich in protein, come three in one fruit and, as noted by experts, generate satiety.
The transition to massification
Kahai is the name of the company created by the Jaramillo brothers to become the first to commercialize the products taken from the cacay in the country, which can already be seen in a low proportion in Colombia, “which is possible to do with wild harvests,” says Camilo. But since the objective was to obtain a good supply base to enter the national and world market, they established 700 hectares of grafted crops, of which many plants have already been growing for a year and a half on a plot of land in Villavicencio (Meta).
With this crop, they will produce 3,500 tons of walnuts per year and increase their payroll from 13 employees to 40. But that’s not where the project stops. The goal is to reach 5,000 hectares in the next five years, through small producers, cattle ranchers, strategies with oil companies (promoting productive reforestation) and commercial plantations, in order to produce around 20,000 tons of walnuts annually.
Presale is a success
Last week, 600 Colombian businessmen and 400 American buyers met in New York, convened by Proexport, to start looking at the market and doing business within the framework of the free trade agreement between Colombia and the United States, which was launched on May 15. Kahai was there showing its products, making pre-sales, anticipating the volumes that its 700 hectares will provide. A process in which they have already measured the European and Asian markets, where they were able to validate that there was a lot of commercialization potential.
Reaching the United States becomes a challenge: it is the largest producer and consumer of walnuts in the world. Only in that country do they eat what the whole of Europe consumes. California has about 300,000 hectares of almonds and 160,000 hectares of pistachios. But Camilo and Alberto are calm: “It is difficult to innovate because it is not often that new nuts come onto the market. We want this to become the icon of Colombian biodiversity,” they say, while they say that the fruit and oil have been fully accepted everywhere they have presented the cacay.
“On the one hand, there is a preference for the natural. The consumption of walnuts is growing a lot in the world due to the trend towards health, and this is a source of energy with low carbohydrates, ideal for diets because they generate satiety. This nut, compared to others, has a nutritional composition rich in proteins, minerals, omega and fiber, helps intestinal transit, lowers cholesterol levels, is very tasty and has a good size”, they say.
Kahai arrived at the macro business roundtable in the world’s capital with the intention of making contacts with snack food distributors to reach the channels with a finished product or to supply nut processors that already have its brand to innovate within their portfolio with a new variety.
The balance was positive. The only thing they need is for the trees to start producing results. And that will be in 2014, when the grafted plants will be three years old, the investment, which already exceeds $2 billion, will begin to bear fruit, and the world will discover a new nut that grows, for the good of foodies, in the middle of the Colombian plains.
