www.ebizguides.com
198
Agriculture and Fisheries
technology of their time. In the 1950’s, coffee became
a very well-paid crop on the international markets
reaching $USD100. With all this additional money
they founded Banco de Comercio (Commerce
Bank), Molinos de El Salvador (MOLSA) (Grain
Mills of El Salvador), they also founded a shrimp
fishing company, a cement factory and an instant
coffee factory called “Listo” (Ready) and assorted
companies, which gives the Hill Group a reputation
of entrepreneurial power in El Salvador.
After the diversification stage of the 50’s, they
suffered the nationalization of their assets in the
90’s, but over time they recovered. In the early
2000’s they had share holdings in the Cuscatlán
Group, Bodegas Generales de Depósito (General
Deposit Warehouses), AIG Unión y Desarrollo (AIG
Union and Development), Seguros e Inversiones
(Insurance and Investments), and other coffee
export companies, marketing of goods and real
estate companies.
With the arrival of international financial groups the
Salvadoranbankingsystembecame internationalized
and the Grupo Hill sold nearly all their shares, only
keeping their coffee farms and its production and
Telecam, a telephone company.
Hill Group currently has about 900 farms where they
harvest 120, 000 quintals of coffee per year, making
them the owners of 11% of the total cultivated area
of coffee in the country. It is expected that they will
harvest about 1.5 million quintals for El Salvador.
They export to countries such as Japan, Germany,
the United States and north and central European
countries.
Grupo Hill is the living history of El Salvador, an
emblematic group that returns to its origins in
coffee.
“El Salvador is at a central location, thereby
developing a culture of trade between the north
and south. The Salvadoran is a born trader, skillful
at business. Eventhough it is a country without
raw materials and where agriculture plays an
increasingly reduced role, the country has begun
to emphasize services in Telecommunications,
for instance. With the strong dollar, we have to
streamline the entire method of dealing with work
permit applications so that foreign companies can
be installed as rapidly as possible. We need to
develop the dry canal, so that all goods coming
from the Pacific by land are transferred to the
Atlantic. This promises us a great future as a
logistics hub. “
Roberto Llach Hill, President of Hill Group
INGENIO EL ÁNGEL, S.A. DE C.V.
– (EL ÁNGEL SUGAR MILL)
Juan Tennant Wright
President
Carretera a Quezaltepeque, Km 14½,
Apopa, San Salvador
Tel: (+503) 2216 0074
Fax: (+503) 2216 0732
www.iea.com.sv
Activity: Sugar Refinery
Date of Creation: 1882
Sales: 75 million US Dollars
Employees: 700
Created in 1882, Ingenio El Ángel (the Angel sugar
refinery) is the oldest of the 6 current sugar refineries
operating in El Salvador and the second in production
quantity. It produces over 2.6 million sugar quintals
and expects to reach 3 million quintaes produced
next year. The total production of the country is 12
million quintals, approximately 5 million sugar tons. Its
market share is 22% and it is the best yielding refinery
producing 245 pounds of sugar per ton of cane.
It is a sugar refinery that is constantly developing,
constantly investing and improving the processes
that convert sugar cane. This plant is exemplary
in terms of holding certifications such as ISO
and complying with ethical, legal, environmental,
business and existing business.
One peculiarity of El Salvador is that the sugar
refinery cannot own the sugar cane land. The
producer sells its production to the sugar refinery
keeping 54.5% of the profit and the sugar refinery
the remaining 44.5%. In this way producers have a
good price on the market.
It is part of the Salvadoran Sugar Association and
develops projects for life improvement for the rural
“sugar” rural population, thanks to Fundazucar.
Through a panel “Alianzas para inversiones sociales
en salud” (Alliances for social health investment),
together with USAID and other organizations it
supports children with problems of malnutrition and
promotes volunteering programs in schools and also
has mobile clinics.