The cereal revives a town in Zamora thanks to the hiring of immigrants | Spain

The bull vault, like so many other peoples of emptied Spain, was a place full of life that reached 2,000 neighbors. Today in this municipality of Zamora only 700 people live, but there are dozens of Latin American families who are breaking that trend that leaves houses, schools and empty businesses. The people grow. It can be seen in the miscegenation of children who leave in the school stampede, in the seseo intermingled with the local accent and in the male banana sold in the grocery store. The key is in a cereal company.

Since 2023, dozens of Peruvians and Colombians are being located in rehabilitated houses after abandoned five years. They are enough so that, given the growing demand and reluctance of many neighbors to lease or sell their homes even when they fall apart, the vault has a tensioning real estate market. Migrants celebrate the adaptation where depopulation appeared.

Trucks load cereal in the ships of Commcertrans (Group CT), a company that merchants wholesale agricultural subjects and has become a constant source of employment. A barr operator while another, on a machine, moves the grain. Sebastián Cardona, a 26 -year -old Colombian, tells how for a few days – ”with a employment contract!” – Already Faena. « I am too happy, » he celebrates. Cardona received the job offer and returned to his country to do the necessary procedures after splicing 10 months of precarious jobs, paid in B. He lives with his wife and two children, María Fernanda and Sebastián, eight and two years old. « They are very rigged in the town, at school, making friends and my wife is happy, she wants to work anywhere, » he celebrates. Cardona's family and his wife already add 10 members in the town, between brothers, couples, grandmothers and children.

Mabel Hernández, 45, Company Human Resources Responsiblemanages the high, necessary before the Spanish scarcity. Salaries fit the agreement, he says. « We try to give work to the rural world and give palms if we find workers, so we encourage people to stay here, » says Zamorana. Soon they will require six engineers for a laboratory that they are raising on the grounds. Electrifications, mechanical or vehicle repairs or even clientele wines are hired with native workers or producers: « I first call local people, Zamora has trouble starting and we want to create employment here, » says Hernández, with difficulties in finding national chauffeurs: « A Spaniard does not want to come, move his family and then spend the week out. Foreigners, as they come, choose to settle in a town that dies. ” The company has 45 employees, 19 of them foreigners, and these are dedicated to driving trucks, managing the warehouse or logistics work. These contracts to Latin Americans have meant 54 new neighbors for the census because they have brought their families.

The manager of the company and couple of Hernández, Jonathan Santarén, 39, grew up in vault. “We have done it for our people, so that it would not lose population, there is no Spanish labor for these jobs. A requirement is to register and live here, the company and Mabel strive to help them bring families, ”he explains. Among all the new families have filled the classrooms of the school with eight new students and already add up to twenty, in addition to four others who have enrolled in the Institute of Fuentesaúco, the closest. « The director has asked for another teacher and more investment for classrooms, they are falling, » says Santarén.

The challenge, as throughout Spain, is still housing. The company invested 80,000 euros to buy and rehabilitate a house for rent, for 300 per month, with a purchase option for a family. The company tracks the scarce real estate market to strengthen the workforce and its relatives: buy, readjust and provide at affordable prices. Santarén regrets the classic attitude of heirs who for fear or disinterest do not rent or sell: « They prefer to drop them. » Given the shortage, the CT group, says it will build eight houses to offer them at more favorable prices.

There are other problems, such as transportation: there are hardly any buses to Zamora and, in the absence of cards or private vehicles, the new ones see them and wish to go to the city. A potential employment, if the City Council provides license, would be a taxi. Santarén Pray the Mayor's commitment on the road that leads to the facilities or in connectivity: « We do not have fiber, we use a house repeater and send the signal by means of an antenna. » The governor (PP) has not responded to the contacts of El País.

The Peruvian Ana Huambachano has gone from sleeping with her eight -year -old son in a park in Madrid to live for rent in a renewed house of the vault. « Why did I brought the child? » He wondered until things began to straighten. Her husband, truck driver, completed the papers and arrived in Zamora with two of her children. From that stage he speaks with pain. « Here are other workers who previously lived in basements in Almeria and only let them be there at midnight at six in the morning. » The woman studies a socio -health care course to serve the many elders of the people. « Some work comes out in black, but I don't want to be crossed with arms, but do things well to bring my mother and my other two children, » he says. Huambachano thanks Mabel and Jonathan for her support to get a home. « People love us and we, a 97 -year -old man whom I helped bed calls me 'daughter' and hugs me when I tell him that I took good grades. »

The satisfaction reigns in the abode of Karen Canayo, a 40 -year -old Peruvian, between five and 22. Her husband, Walter Ortega, drives trucks from Monday to Friday. They only complain, and little, of the cold: this Sunday they have known the snow and Fabricio, 18 years old and just a month and a half in Spain, shiver. The eldest, Diego, has been in the vault for 15 months and already has plans for the future: « I am finishing the ESO in Zamora, I work on what arises and then I want to do an FP to pay me the mechanics studies. » « People are sociable, respectful, Peruvians have made pineapple and mix with the Spaniards to play football, we are more, » he says, before recommending his brother the verbena and the bustle of the festivities: « You will have a good time! »