Coffee
and cocoa used to provide most of Venezuela’s export revenues
until the discovery of the black gold in the early 1900’s.
Colonial coffee plantations such as Hacienda
El Carmen can still be visited now in the Venezuelan
Andes,
where the traditional agriculture techniques of the Timoto-Cuicas
are still visible in the mountainous slopes, cultivated
with roots and tubers.
Cross
the rainforests of the coastal range and the Henri Pittier
National Park on foot from Turmero to Chuao, and pass
through cocoa plantations before ending the trip in the
Hotel
Hacienda El Portete, a restored cacao hacienda located
close to the colonial town of Choroni.
World renowned, these cocoa beans are still exported to
places like the United States, Belgium and Japan.
A
word of Taino origin meaning parcel of land or farm, the
Conuco is a traditional farming system of the so-called
extensive agriculture that is very well known to Venezuelan
indigenous groups. In the Orinoco
Delta, the Waraos cultivate the Moriche Palm, from
which they extract the very solicited palm heart or palmito,
but also starch. The ethnic groups of the Venezuelan Amazon,
including the Yanomamis and the Yekuanas, use the prune
and burn to build theirs in the thickness of the jungle
and grow staples such as yucca or cassava, sugarcane,
banana and pineapple, between others. Visit them during
our Natural
Cataniapo excursion or a longer tour, including the
Autana
Tepuy and the Cuao
Hill River Ventures.
Contact
us to include agricultural
tours in a customized itinerary of travel to Venezuela.
