A united group
Yalongo brings together 9 cocoa farmers welded by the Earth, the quality convictions linked to it and the family bond. The idea of the cooperative is an initiative which was born from a worrying economic observation, the producers are little or not at all protected by their own production. The young succession is rare and is struggling to set up. Yalongo is a solidarity initiative aimed at reconciliation between the Earth and the Farmer working on it. A space that allows the expression of a local sovereign identity. Yalongo cooperative is a response to emerging economic growth in the MBAM-ET-KIM region. With the participation and the support of the traditional chief of the village of Yalongo, canton regrouping essentially the Bavëk group.
A cell of excellence
The group is organized like a family unit. each to his plot, for the benefit of the common good. Respect for its plantation is supported by the dynamics of the cooperative and the organizational advantages that it makes available. Maintenance, harvesting and production are organized at the same time in order to create a collective synergy contributing to the cohesion of a strong and committed group respecting the standards of excellence production.
A cultural testimony
The village Matriarch integrated into our cooperative represents one of the most important cultural legacies of Yalongo. At the foot of the rock of Yalongo, its plants are steeped in history and we have seen family generations grow. The last one attempted cocoa production in the 1960s and the last generation.Since production intensifies and qualify goes hand in hand. The Bavëk was the most important group in Cameroon, they were the stock tribe of the Fang-Beti peoples (500,000 inhabitants while Cameroon had only two million around 1840) the one wich responded to German attacks during colonization. We find Bavëk today scaterred throughout the national territory and even beyond borders. Yalongo recount the character of the Bavëk spirit in his beans. its Survival, its willpower, its light intensity in memory in a single seed. Yalongo keeping coca beans as a memory of those fight.
Bibliography : "MIMBOO, Asem Queen" / "Amicale du Mbam" (community organization)
A spiritual vestige
Isn't this tree strange? The cocoa tree. Isn't it a reminder of African ancestrality? Towards the desire to eat worship, towards the desire to become? The main stake of the cooperative lies in the "sharing" and the sovereignty of this word. This tree becomes the manifestation of an exchange and a reconciliation. The Manding missions sent to Meso-America* reminds us of this desire. Implant the best terrestrial know-how for the simple memory that constitutes the tree of life. Yalongo cooperative works for the safeguarding and sharing of a certain spiritual and ancestral plant heritage. Cocoa is a special anchor, which the Bavëk communities have always preserved. Our exchanges for life are a perpetual movement which modifies the economic and social challenges of the region at first, for the world at a second time.
* Bernadino de Sahagun 1946