Toledo Cacao Festival 2008

Artisans workshop

A workshop to help artisans in the District improve their sales was held in Punta Gorda on Wednesday 26th March. Judy Bergsma -- founder of Belize Crafts Ltd which sells its "maya bags" in Belize and internationally -- led the course which particularly focussed on selling skills and display skills. Attendees were from several of the inland villages, with a range of crafts and products from home-made organic chocolate to woven baskets, embroidery to carved calabash.

Gregor Hargrove

Our Committee Treasurer, Gregor Hargrove, sadly died on Monday 17th March. It was a great shock, and his death is a huge loss to the CacaoFest Committee - his commitment and enthusiasm were key in organising the Festival. The Committee, in conjunction with the Cacao Growers Association, hope to establish a lasting memorial to Gregor's work, but in the meantime our best tribute is to make the second (and future) Cacao Festivals as successful as our first. You can read more about Gregor's contribution on the Cacao Growers section of the website.

San Antonio Fair

CacaoFest will be attending the San Antonio Fair held this Friday, 30th November, along with the Toledo Cacao Growers Association. San Antonio is the largest (Mopan) Maya village in Toledo, situated on a series of hills, close to the refreshing falls, and is an important cacao gowing community. The village features in next year's Cacao Trail tours, and is also participating in the documentation of the Maya legends - one of CacaoFest's community projects for 2008.

World Responsible Tourism Day

With one of our aims being to promote sustainable tourism in the Toledo District, CacaoFest was delighted to participate in the first ever TOLTEX (Toledo Tourism Expo) held in Punta Gorda's Central Park on Saturday, 10th November to coincide with World Responsible Tourism Day.

As well as reminding the local community of the date of next year's Festival, it also gave us the opportunity to meet up with some of this year's craft suppliers, as well as meeting new faces and learning about new products. Two tickets to the Wine&Chocolate opening event were raffled, and won by Joanna Monk of Punta Gorda - congratulations Joanna!

Flying high!

With the first year's Festival now under our belt, we are now looking to attract attention from overseas.

We are featured in the next edition of "Tropic's View" - the official CacaoFest airline - which will be distributed locally, nationally, and internationally through their attendance at travel trade shows.

Many thanks to the team at Tropic Air!