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Avilanian Cannery Workers Engaged in Pineapple Processing |
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Written by Héctor E. Paz Alomar Photo: Nohema Díaz |
Monday, 09 July 2012 11:37
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 For the third year in a row, and due to the gradual recovery undergone by the plantations, workers at the Majagua cannery, about 27 kilometers away from the capital city of the central province of Ciego de Ávila, are alredy involved in the pineapple industrial process.
Ángel Prieto Goenaga, head of Production of the cannery, said that for this season they have contracted about 1500 tons of fruits with the Ministry of Agriculture, of which they have already assumed 1 265. The factory was inaugurated on May 13, 1957 to take on the increasing production of fruits.
The number of tons already produced, according to Prieto Goenaga, represents 84 percent of the contracted and 68 above the total amount of fruit received in the previous harvest.
The raw material comes, essentially, from the provinces of Villa Clara and Matanzas, whose producers have respectively contributed 75 and 21 percent of the volume processed to date. The rest belongs to the Avilanian growers, since most of the products of this territory are processed in the factory of the Ciego de Ávila Citrus Company.
This season the Majagua cannery will process pineapple to produce juice, slices and chunks intended for the market in foreign exchange, as well as jam and concentrate for domestic consumption.
These days, the factory has started processing mango. The plan is to receive some 300 tons supplied by farmers from the province.
Reporting to the food industry, the cannery, was previously engaged in the tomato harvest and processed 7 983 tons, which represented 72 per cent of compliance in regard to the plan.
Several factors contributed to this low result, among them, delays in planting, which led to defaults on delivery plans in January and February, a large harvest peak in March that the factory could not fully take on, and problems with water in that industry, which limited the receipt of raw materials, although the agricultural sector met the daily contracts.
With the figure achieved they attained 1 567 tons including tomato paste in cans and in bulk, of about 1 433 planned, which places the factory among the best in the country on having a yield of 109 percent.
The tomato line was inaugurated half a century ago and was one of the first works built by the triumphant Cuban Revolution. It is still in operation because of the efforts of a devoted group of innovators, who continuously impose their creativity to the limitations of the machinery that bears high levels of obsolescence.
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