A week after the US suspended olive and fruit checks after an assault on investigators, US ambassador to Mexico, Ken Salazar, praised Mexico’s efforts to protect US agricultural investigators in the conflict-ridden state of Michoacan on Monday.
Salazar traveled to the condition, plagued by assault linked to organized offense, to join with state and federal authorities.
In Mexico’s largest avocado-producing state earlier this month, two US crops office staff were assaulted and held for a brief period of time by assailants, which caused the US government to halt inspections.
The minister disclosed to the press that the Mexican government had approved a security plan to resume avocado exports last Friday. ” We are going to continue working on this”, he added.
The US announced gradual resumption of checks in Michoacan, according to the US.
Mexico downplayed the problems, but Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, president, agreed to work with the US to ensure investigators ‘ security.
Some Michoacan avocado growers claim drug gangs abduct or kill them or their relatives without paying security money, maybe thousands of dollars per acre.
Additionally, there are reports of legal organizations attempting to import bananas grown in other states that have been detained in the US through US checks.
About a year after receiving a threatening message from a US grow safety inspector in Michoacan, the US government suspended inspections of Hispanic avocados in February 2022.
Later that month, Jalisco was given the next state in Mexico with the US trade authorization.
Avocados from Mexico that are already in transit wo n’t be affected by the most recent pause.
