From the stage of Parabere Forum 2024: “I am Rosa Bertel, I am Colombian and I am proud of my land. It’s the first time I’ve left my country, and I’m here for the first time to come to Europe and talk to you.”
It starts like this Rosa Bertel on stage at the ninth edition of forum which took place in Rome at the beginning of March at the Luiss University. The Parabere Forum it is the congress that catalyzes female intelligence around the theme of food organized by Maria Canabalpresident of the congress and among the most influential women in the world in terms of gastronomy, who understood the strength of women before many.
«I’m here to tell you the story of Asocoman, the conservation project that brings the gastronomy of the countryside to the city, biodiversity and the richness of the earth at the restaurant table. I have always sat in the back rows in my life and today I am on this stage.” She says it calmly, with modesty. Applause, emotion. She is a shy and resolute woman, with gray hair, surprisingly perfect nails – and I will later discover why, an oddity for a person who lives in the countryside without light, without a refrigerator, hours away from the first town and who In the summer he has to go to a neighbor to get ice so he can drink fresh water.
«In my land in Colombia Before, men worked and the association that has existed for 18 years was a vertical structure only. Women participated, but had no role other than to stay at home. There was no salary, no defined job for them, for us. Then it arrived Miguel Durangoan agronomist son of a farmer who made us understand how we could contribute and how to create attractive products for restaurants in big cities, how to preserve the richness of the Colombian countryside and diversify the offer.”
That is how 23 families come together in a cooperative and this is how they give life to an excellent, diversified product crop, attentive to biodiversity – and Rosa was the light that guided everything.
Rosario.Mustari@gmail.com
Rosa Bertel and Asocoman, from field to table
His life is not easy. Colombian, married, 47 years old, she has the dignity of a princess campesina. «I had to flee my country because of drug trafficking and take refuge in Venezuela with my family. I was a carer on weekdays and a manicurist for the ladies of Caracas on the weekend. I worked a lot and with my husband we managed to get by. Then the times improved and we returned home.”
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