On 27 and 28 October, beekeepers and technicians from Bolivia, Paraguay and Argentina gathered in Tarija for the First Gran Chaco Beekeepers’ Meeting, organized by Fundación AVINA with the participation of INTA technicians Cecilia Dini and Gustavo Cabrera, as part of the FONTAGRO–PROADAPT partnership. Through a foresight exercise, participants defined a shared goal: “To work towards sustainable beekeeping that helps improve the quality of life of the people of the Gran Chaco, producing honeys valued worldwide for their diversity and cultural identity.”

On 28 October, representatives of IPTA (Myrtha Zarza, Director of the Central Chaco Research Centre), INIAF (Luis Acosta, Director in Tarija) and INTA agreed to coordinate the work of the three institutions, map where beekeepers are located in each country and draw up a joint work plan. IPTA and INIAF also expressed their wish to join REDLAC, the Latin American and Caribbean beekeeping network already supported by FONTAGRO. In parallel, AVINA and INTA agreed that PROADAPT would finance demonstration units in Bolivia and Paraguay, while the FONTAGRO project would handle their installation and start-up.

📄 Report 2: proceedings of the workshops and the Beekeepers’ Meeting (PDF, in Spanish)
📄 Report 1: research institutes’ areas of interest and capacities (PDF, in Spanish)
🔗 Project page (in Spanish)