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Our History Birth The cooperative, “La Terra e Il Cielo”, was born on May 5, 1980 by a group of young, ambitious people with strong ideological motivations. (See Purpose and Professional Ethic). Thanks to the far-sightedness of some managers of the public institute (IRAB), the Coop was able to obtain tree agricultural loans with 32 hectares of land on the sweet, rolling hills of Italy’s Marches Region close to the Adriatic Sea. The First Activities From the beginning the cooperative was full of enthusiasm and intensely experimented various methods of Organic Agriculture, farming varieties, and different types of cultivation. The company experimented all types of Organic Agriculture known at the time including Biodynamic Agriculture and Fukuoka Natural Agriculture. In the first nine years, Biodynamic Agriculture was the principle method chosen by the cooperative which made it the first productive structure in Italy to obtain the Biodynamic trademark for its pasta. Due to an unfavourable economic return in managing both the Organic and Biodynamic sectors (be it for the materials or for the products), the cooperative decided to favour and diffuse the same rigorous method of Organic Agriculture for all its affiliates. DIFFUSING ORGANIC AGRICULTURE The cooperative has distinguished itself in two major ways. Firstly, for the perseverance for which it pursues Organic and Ecological quality of its products. Secondly, for the intense activity it has carried out in spreading Organic Agriculture in the Marches and throughout Italy. Here are some of our notable activities: |
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Adherence to the Italian Association for Agricultural Biodynamics. |
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Promotion to the foundation of the Marches Regional Department for Biodynamic Agriculture. | ||||
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Promotion of the Organic Fair in Senagallia with adherence from producers in all of Italy. | ||||
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Participation at the National Meetings, ”Cos’e’ Biologico”, to define the first Organic provisions in Italy. | ||||
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Participation in drafting proposals for CEE Organic Provisions. | ||||
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Foundation of “AMAB” Association for Organic Agriculture, recognized by the Minister of Agriculture in 1993. | ||||
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Participation in the founding of AMAB. | ||||
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Participation in the founding of Marche BIO, a consortium of organic products in the Marches Region. | ||||
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Participation and promotion of various initiatives, meetings, conferences and seminars on Organic Agriculture. | ||||
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Marketing and Processing From the beginning, the cooperative has carried out the decision to process and market its own products. In this way, durum wheat becomes pasta, soft wheat becomes bread, barley becomes coffee, sheep’s milk becomes pecorino and ricotta cheese. This decision became necessary for the following reasons: not to lose the organic qualities of raw materials when using stockpiles and traditional processing. To control every productive step from the raw materials to the final product To provide work for our own working members To offer other Organic Agriculturists the possibility to obtain favourable prices for their personal production Cooperative of Working Members and Agricultural Affiliates The tendency to favour agriculturists who convert to the organic method along with commercial success obtained in both Italy and abroad allows for quite a unique internal framework. Not only a cooperative with working members but more and more a COOP formed by a number of small and mid-sized agricultural producers who own their own companies specializing in Organic Agriculture. These companies, in turn, confer their primary substances to the COOP for processing and marketing along with their own finished products when they have them (such as wine and oil). Our Future The cooperative is currently preparing itself for a new step: to become transnational by incorporating itself with a cooperative of small organic coffee producers in Guatemala. (See Guatemala Project) |
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