Mexico City, October 18, 2017. Considering that the US Department of Agriculture unjustifiably damages imports of Mexican avocados, except in Michoacan, the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas may be affected. North (NAFTA).
A total of 19 US agricultural groups sent a letter to Sonny Perdue, Secretary of Agriculture, to question the final rule that expanded Mexican imports of avocado in May 2016, but the operational plan for Mexican producers to comply with state sanitary standards United to date is not yet signed or public.
In the letter, the farmers talk about the restrictions that the government of the neighboring country put on the Mexican avocados, to which national producers pointed out that if there is no technical justification that prevents the export of the fruit to the EE. UU. the Department of Agriculture must sign documents that allow more product to enter that nation.
Farmers recalled that in January Jalisco tried to export its first 100 tons of the fruit to the American Union, but failed because of the lack of the so-called “work plan”, negative because the entity has 100 years without being able to sell avocados in U.S.
For the owner José Calzada, at the time Secretary of Agriculture, Livestock, Rural Development, Fisheries and Food (SAGARPA) “the idea is that now the region of Jalisco is opened, and then we can move forward with the State of Mexico and Puebla, which are also aguacateras.
It is worth remembering that Mexico is the world’s largest avocado exporter by selling 46% of the avocado it consumes to the neighboring country, after which in 1997 that country gradually lifted the avocado embargo to the Aztec nation after 83 years, until allowing in the year 2007 the income of the fruit, but as long as it was cultivated in Michoacán.