Juan David Latorre
The exhibition A plant from another world. A journey through Ecuadorian cocoa was presented yesterday by the Embassy of Ecuador in the Bonsai Greenhouse Room of the Real Jardín botánico of Madrid, with the support of INSUD Pharma. The exhibition will be on display until 7 July.
The director of the Real Jardín Botánico, M. Paz Martín, spoke at the presentation. ‘This exhibition, she pointed out, means adding art to the valuable scientific and historical relations that Spain and Ecuador have traditionally maintained and maintain as nations, and singularly the Royal Botanical Garden through botanical expeditions to discover the flora of Ecuadorian territory in past centuries.’
“In 2018, the director recalled, a study published in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution revealed that the oldest evidence of cocoa consumption had been located at the archaeological site of Santa Ana-La Florida, located on the eastern slope of the Andes, in the Amazon of Ecuador. The remains of cocoa in ceremonial vessels from the Mayo-Chinchipe culture (3500-1500 BC) confirmed that cocoa was already being consumed in the area as a beverage 5,300 years ago. In 2011, Ecuador received the award for ‘best cocoa for its oral quality’ and ‘best cocoa bean by geographical region’ at the Salon du Chocolat in Paris.”
The Ecuadorian ambassador, Wilma Andrade, then addressed the audience, pointing out that ‘cocoa is part of our culture and our identity, a seed that carries with it a millenary history of trade, of ancestral rituals, of migrant peoples and conquerors, a world of social and cultural exchange, and which are the origin of our roots and our values. This gourmet bean, today identified as originating in Ecuador, has an incomparable quality and also reflects the history of a hard-working and resilient people, whose cocoa production at the beginning of the last century between 1770 and 1842 covered 25% of the international demand for this product and came to represent 70% of the country’s exports”.
‘We are aware, Wilma Andrade continued, that we are facing new challenges such as sustainability and threats to cocoa and the entire food chain is at risk due to climate change, so presenting a story about this wonderful plant in an environment, such as the Real Jardín Botánico, where the importance of nature is understood and valued, commits us and reaffirms us that it is the right place to do it’.
The Ecuadorian ambassador concluded by stating that ‘cocoa is a witness to the historical cultural and scientific ties that unite Ibero-America and that it represents the fulfilled dream of many researchers and botanists, who tried to introduce this plant into the collections of European botanical gardens centuries ago and that today in the Real Jardín Botánico it is a reality’.
The exhibition is curated by Sabrina Guerra, historian at the Universidad San Francisco de Quito, and Vanessa Quintanar, member of the VISUALRACE Research Project Science, Racism and Visual Colonialism (CSIC/UCM) and specialist in the representation of American foods in the European arts and sciences, with the scientific advice of Miguel Ángel Puig-Samper, Research Professor at the CSIC and specialist, among other subjects, in scientific expeditions in America and the scientific work of Alexander von Humboldt.
