The Government of Chubut, through the Ministry of Environment and Control of Sustainable Development, together with the Ministries of Fisheries and Labor, assisted the Cooperative for the Collection, Collection and Processing of Sea Products (CRAPPMAR), in the town of Camarones so that it can access the Organic Algae Certification. This work allowed this local enterprise to access said NOP-USDA Organic Certification based on the American Standard of Organic Production, corresponding to wild-harvested products. Certification has been granted through the International Agricultural Organization (OIA), a leader in organic certification processes, with an extensive presence in Patagonia Argentina, as a result of the actions that have been carried out from the “Sustainable Chubut” Program.

Tools for local production

In relation to this issue, the Minister of Environment and Control of Sustainable Development of Chubut, Eduardo Arzani, pointed out that “it is very important that entrepreneurs incorporate this type of tools that add value to local production, improving the competitiveness of products, within the framework of the growing demands of consumers, regarding environmentally differentiated products ”.

Employment generation

For his part, the Secretary of Labor, Cristian Ayala, congratulated the members of the CRAPPMAR Cooperative, highlighting “that the Secretariat seeks to strengthen the actions related to the promotion of employment, with an eye on the creation of self-managed schemes, with a leading participation of different expressions of associativism ”.

“A significant step for the Cooperative”

Asked about this achievement, the president of CRAPPMAR, Esteban Robert, stated that “without a doubt, this is a significant step in the short history of our Cooperative, which clearly marks our vision of working in processes of differentiation and value added at source, of local production, integrating the sustainability objectives from the economic, social and environmental aspects ”.

Finally, the person in charge of the “Sustainable Chubut” Program, Rubén Contreras, explained that “this program that I am in charge of defines a strategy to address the local problems of each municipality, with the ultimate objective of moving towards a transformation process of the Matrix Provincial production based on sustainable development ”.

“We seek that it contemplates not only the economic dimensions of development, but also the social and environmental ones,” the official concluded.