Jojoba - FINCAS de AMBATO -

Jojoba Fincas de Ambato S.A

This project was born in 1995 when a group of investors decided to start a jojoba plantation in the Province of Catamarca (Argentina), and acquired a 450 Ha field. For taxation purposes, the plantation is divided into two adjoining units, Fincas de Ambato SA and Nepejo SA; however, given that these two companies share the same shareholding structure, they make up Fincas de Ambato, a single production unit for all administrative and operational purposes.

Their two main shareholders are Sistemas Unificados de Crédito Dirigido S.A. and Cartasur Cards S.A., with head offices in Buenos Aires and Lomas de Zamora (Province of Buenos Aires), respectively. The project comprises a plantation totalling 350 has, 274 of which are already established. Although the first cuttings were planted in 1997, it was not until 2000 that genetically superior clones were obtained, and first planted later in March 2001 (Picture 2v). The first harvested jojoba seeds were exported to the U.S. in 2002. Fincas de Ambato’s staff is made up of 18 year-round workers living in the field, and 20 seasonal employees (working on a 6-months-a-year basis). The total investment in the project as of March 2003 equals USD 4,660,000.
Fincas de Ambato's main goal consists in setting up a sustainable agricultural project in the Arid Chaco area of Catamarca by means of the commercial production of jojoba. This implies producing, on a regular basis, all-natural jojoba seeds, free of any sort of genetically-modified organisms and/or pesticides, using handling practices that are compatible with the fragile ecosystem of the Chaco area.

-Executive Personnel-

Dr. Miguel Elguer - Chairman of the Board of Directors.
Certified Public Accountant. Businessman involved in different projects in the credit and finance areas. President of Cartasur Cards CORP., Crédito de Promoción Comercial S.A., Unired S.A., and Redycard S.A., Vice-president of the Argentine Chamber of Consumer Credit Institutions (Cámara Argentina de Entidades de Crédito para el Consumo).

Ing. Ricardo Ayerza (h) - Agricultural Engineer - Technical Director.
Engineer in Agricultural Production. Associate Researcher at the University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, U.S.A. He has been involved in jojoba research and development activities since 1976 in Argentina, Peru, and the U.S. He has published two books and over 60 scientific and technical works on jojoba in Australia, Israel, U.K., U.S.A., and Latin America.

Sr. Antonio Caballero - Field Manager.
He has been involved in jojoba growing activities since 1976, when he was assistant field work manager in the project by means of which jojoba was introduced into Argentina. Since then, he has worked uninterruptedly in jojoba cultivation, in plantations settled in the Dry Chaco area of Córdoba, Salta and Catamarca.

In this Web Site you will find information about our individual initiative in “ Fincas de Ambato”, and about the culture of the Jojoba in the Argentine Republic. Experiencies in other regions are also disclosed. However, the development of this cultivation in the Arid Chaco of Catamarca is detailed in a characteristic and scientific way the contents of this Web Site are periodically updated by aur maintenance technicions. If you have any daubts or comments, please contact us and we will answer you shortly.

:: Versión en Español ::

-Introduction-

In 1976, at the initiative of Pedro L. Qüerio, Guillermo Triest and Raúl Fasciolo, jojoba cultivation was first undertaken in Argentina. This first planting of seeds from the University of Arizona was carried out in Las Oscuras, Córdoba, within the Arid Chaco area’s ecosystem. Some of these original specimens have managed to survive cattle to our present date. Twenty-eight years later, jojoba crops in the arid areas of the Greater Chaco and the Monte desert have positioned Argentina as the world’s leading jojoba oil and seed producer and exporter.

Even though virtually all jojoba is currently used by the cosmetics industry for manufacturing top-quality products, jojoba pioneers had envisioned the plant’s liquid wax as a basic element for the pharmaceutical industry first, followed by the energy sector. The first pharmaceutical study to provide an early indication of the potential underlying jojoba wax can be traced back to Argentina in 1949. The research work performed by medical doctors José W. Tobias, Aimar F. Mazzuco, and Raúl J. Latorre at the Instituto Modelo de Medicina Luis Agote medical institute in Buenos Aires, based on the application of wax from seeds collected in the U.S., provided a way to control the TB bacillus.

Later on, through state-owned Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales (YPF), Argentina identified the advantages of introducing jojoba into the formulation of oils subjected to extremely demanding conditions. For that purpose, the company used wax from seeds obtained from the University of Arizona 1978 and, later on, from the first seeds harvested in Córdoba in 1985. At present, when the entire world has its eyes turned to “clean”, renewable alternatives to the limited and highly polluting fossil energy resources, jojoba has become center stage for the oil industry once again.

This section has been designed to provide to readers interested in learning about jojoba development in Argentina published papers and research work, allowing a better understanding of the path that producers, technicians and scientists have gone down, step by step, to turn Argentina into the world’s main supplier of jojoba liquid wax.

Reference material has been grouped into papers, books and government orders, rules and regulations, organized by year of publication. We have included some purchase/reading alternatives depending on the availability of the material:

- Summary or full text: a summary or the full text is available on the Internet
- Bookstores: the material can be purchased online (more than one alternative may be provided).
- Libraries: libraries where the material is available.

Works currently unavailable at bookstores or libraries will be progressively digitalized and added as the appropriate use authorizations are granted.

Links:

www.cicsoils.com
www.chiacorp.com
www.ijec.net
www.seedsandoils.com
www.floratech.com
www.google.com

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:: Versión en Español ::