About sixty years ago Grandfather Andres Angel Emerenciana saw business potential in his chickens hopping around on his plot of land. Nowadays, chicken farm Punta Blanku is Bonaire’s biggest egg provider. The 20,000 chickens are producing 18,000 eggs a day.
In the Beginning
In the earlier days most families in Bonaire owned a big plot of land they called kunuku, some still do, but only a few people actually put them to commercial use. Grandfather Andres was one of them. Looking at his free-range poultry, at that time a handful of chickens puttering around in the bushes, he decided to collect and
sell their eggs. As one of the cofounders of the LVV (Landbouw, Veeteelt en Visserij/Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries), currently a department of the local government, he became a leading figure in the field of agriculture. His decision to commercialize the egg-laying hens was a success. Due to the arrival of the friars and with them the doctors and customs as well, the demand for eggs increased. Kunukero (farmer or person who owns a kunuku) Emerenciana would pay them daily visits selling the freshly laid merchandise door to door.
Ever changing
Today, the chicken farm Punta Blancu NV (Inc.) is run by his son, director Edwin Emerenciana, his granddaughter manager Nadine Emerenciana, and her brother Anthony Emerenciana. During its 63 (1954) years of existence lots of things have changed. nThe egg selling business remained successful and the handful of chickens became a hundred in no-time. From hundred the farm went on to five hundred and started to grow and sell vegetables and fruits like watermelon as well. After his father died in the seventies, his son Edwin Emerenciana took over. He modernized the farm, concentrated solely on egg-laying hens, and intensified the production of eggs by investing in battery systems. The days, people had to roam the land looking for eggs were definitely over. By 1985 Punta Blanku exploited 5,000 chickens and produced roughly 4,000 eggs a day. Still, it was not enough. The population of Bonaire was growing, hence the demand for eggs. Worldwide it was the era of battery farming. So after the modernization in 1985 the egg-laying hens were held in the so called battery cages of that time. To prevent them from harming each other their beaks were trimmed. These production methods, both debeaking and battery cages, have been and still are the subject of many heated discussions about animal welfare and are therefore banned completely in some countries. Nonetheless in the eighties, nineties and at the beginning of the 21st century it was (and in many places still is) common practice in the poultry industry.
However, in order to meet the fast growing demand for eggs on Bonaire director Edwin Emerenciana needed to expand and professionalize his poultry husbandry even more. By the end of 1997 the chicken farm had a livestock of 10,000 pullets and the collection of eggs was partially automated. In search of better and more efficient production methods Punta Blanku was completely renewed from 2011 and onwards. This time the director was assisted by his daughter Nadine Emerenciana, his son Anthony Emerenciana and senior experts from PUM. PUM Netherlands senior experts is a Dutch volunteer organization that offers entrepreneurs around the world free advice, guidance and expertise. To improve the conditions and production the old batteries were replaced by enriched cages, giving the hens more space, and several new barns were build. Punta Blanku was now able to house 20,000 chickens and sold their eggs to a great number of businesses on the island.
The production process
The production process at chicken farm Punta Blanku starts with the import of day-old chicks from the United States of America and Holland. These chickens are bred for their egg-laying capacity. The chicks arrive debeaked in flocks of 100 birds each and are kept, fed and bred in a big fenced space in one of the barns. The special infrared lamps keep them warm and the high quality poultry feed, which is imported from Holland and beside some additional vitamins and minerals doesn’t contain supplements like antibiotics, keep them healthy. After six weeks the flock is moved to another fenced place in the barn where they can wander around freely until they reach the age of sixteen weeks. When the pullets start laying eggs the whole group of egg-laying hens goes to either the free-range barns or the enriched cages. After the egg-producing period they are replaced by a new flock and locally sold as meat. Just like the eggs, the feces is collected and thrown on big piles on the territory where the air, wind and sun transform it into very useful manure, which is sold to other kunukeros and garden centers like Green Label. The eggs are automatically collected and moved by a conveyor belt to the building where they are manually put in pre-printed from Europe and Venezuela imported recycled egg cartons and neatly and carefully stacked on pallets. These pallets are then taken to restaurants, resorts, hotels and supermarkets by specially designed egg trucks.
“the children of Bonaire shouldn’t go to school on an empty stomach”
Future food
Manager Nadine Emerenciana is very proud of the farm, the work they are doing and the position they manage to accomplish on the local market. They are one of the very few, if not the only company, that is actually producing food for the community on such a large scale, since almost all other commodities including fruit and vegetables are being imported. For manager Emerenciana helping people by producing food even if it can be challenging at times and one has to work hard, is her higher calling. One of the challenges and the reason for many kunukeros to just give up in the end, is the scarcity of water.
Because of its remote location Punta Blanku isn’t connected to the water supply network of the local multi-utility company WEB (Water en Energiebedrijf Bonaire). WEB has two trucks that carry around water, but according to Emerenciana it is far from sufficient and sometimes they don’t get their supply. To help them try to solve their water problem Punta Blanku even invited an irrigation specialist from PUM. Another issue is the infrastructure and, by extension the cost of doing business. “Since Bonaire became part of Holland in 2010, the island opened up to the world market. Surely, competition is healthy, but it should be fair. And because of the current state of the islands’ infrastructure our production costs, the cost of doing business are higher compared to others outside Bonaire”, she explains. But although running a chicken farm on Bonaire is not as easy as people might think it is, she really wouldn’t want to do anything else and has great plans for the future. Of course the main goal is to keep on feeding the community by producing fresh, high quality, and affordable eggs using and searching for even more sustainable and animal-friendly production methods. But her dreams is to export the eggs to places where they are needed the most. Or as she phrases: “In our world there shouldn’t be people dying of hunger. And the children of Bonaire shouldn’t
go to school on an empty stomach.”
Introducing
Born and raised on Bonaire Nadine Emerenciana went to Holland to study. She choose a combination of Economics and Legal Governance and continued with a further study in Social and Legal Services. After living in Holland for 18 years, while working for a courthouse in the southern region of Holland, Rotterdam, and as a coach for the project ‘Direkshon’ to guide Antillean homeless youngsters in Tilburg, her aim and desire to help her people more directly made her move back to Bonaire. The chicken farm of her parents on Bonaire was growing bigger and bigger and home was calling. Moreover she and her brothers had been so happy growing up on the kunuku she wanted to give her kids the same experience and she missed her parents, the island, and the way of life. It was time to help her own people. But before she and her family definitely moved to Bonaire in 2015, there was a long period of going back and forth every six weeks to help her family manage and renew the farm. Her brother Anthony Emerenciana, who studied agriculture, animal husbandry and poultry was already working and helping his father with the farm. For both her partner and Nadine their mission in life is to make the world a better place. And that is exactly what she is trying to do and plans to do as Bonaire’s one and only and biggest producer of homegrown food.