agriculture

Yucca growers develop an alternative flour

The high price of wheat flour has yucca growers seeing dollar signs.

Julio Bermúdez, executive secretary of the Asociación de Pequeños y Medianos Productores (Apemep), said that his group is working on producing a yucca flour to mix with wheat flour.

Apemep is proposing a business deal with Riba Smith supermarkets to create a blend of 10 percent yucca flour and 90 percent wheat flour to be used for bread making.

The project calls for the planting of 365 hectares of yucca at the Cooperative Juan XXIII in the province of Veraguas.

Bermúdez explained that a yucca crop could be harvested this year if growers plant by June and July, but that production depends on being able to install a yucca processing plant in the area.

Apemep has not calculated the project´s total cost, but Bermúdez said that there are also plans to grow an inedible variety of yucca which can be processed to produce ethanol.