In a Bogotá used to the sound of buses, cars’ horns, and bicycle engines, a batucada full of Colombian flavour would be in charge of interrupting the monotonous noise with music to sing the great news: that Friday in April, the PaZate Fair opened its doors at the San Martín Shopping Center to market products and services made and offered by peace signatories.  

This would be the city’s first commercial showcase featuring honey-based products, coffee, craftworks, cocoa, and fashion items, among others, created by individuals from various regions of the country who are in the process of reintegration and are taking bold steps towards peace. 
 

“Today, as a peace signatory and leader of women’s entrepreneurship, I celebrate this opportunity because they are undoubtedly responding to our greatest difficulty as entrepreneurs —the marketing of our products,” says Patricia Piedrahita, a person in the process of reintegration and a member of the Soberanas por la Paz (Sovereigns for Peace) Organization, that offers fashion products with empowering messages that make visible gender struggles.
 

“A special greeting to the peace signatories who, with their lives and processes, make these alternatives become true so that we can move forward,” says Gloria Cuartas, director of the Unit for Implementation of the Peace Agreement, recognizing and highlighting the valuable will for peace of those who now use their hands to harvest coffee, collect honey, weave, design, mold, stamp and work to demonstrate that there is a future for peace. 

The Agency for Reintegration and Normalization, ARN, thanks to which opening the premise was possible, invited the UN Verification Mission in Colombia to witness the progress of the economic and social reintegration of people in the process of reintegration.  
 

Following his first purchase at the store, Alessandro Preti, head of reintegration and rural reform at the Mission, stated: “Former combatants are not simply people in the reintegration process. They want to be active economic actors and participants in the economic and social life of the country. So, I think this is a demonstration of commitment to peace.” 

This fair can be visited at Local 136 of the San Martín Shopping Center in Carrera 7 # 32-12. It will have more than 19 initiatives by peacebuilders, including that of Antonio Zapata, creator of Café Trinidad, who was moved by the achievements and enthusiastic about having his brand at the local, adds: “How nice it is to build peace in Colombia!” 

By: Santiago Puentes Viana
Public Information Officer
UN Verification Mission in Colombia