Samalayuca producers harvested this season 640 hectares of pumpkin and 300 hectares of pepper and tomato, which added to the rest of the vegetables production amounts to approximately 14,000 tons.
Armando Esparza Peña, branch president of the village, said this harvest was consumed mainly in Sonora and Monterrey and exported to parts of the United States.
Peña stated that pumpkin represented 50 percent of the production, while the remaining 50 percent was made up of tomato, pepper, melon and cucumber. The area yields 25 to 30 tons per day.
"Even though this year's pumpkin volume was lower than in 2013, we can comply with the demand from our main buyers, our customers from Juárez and the state of Sonora," said Javier Meléndez, Secretary of the Agricultural Producers Front.
"This season's chilli and tomato production was 50 hectares higher than last year," said the former president of the Samalayuca sectional.
"The variation in production rates was due to the price each product had in 2013," he added.
Melendez said that the price of chilli and tomato in the market last year had remained low, which had allowed farmers to increase the level of the crop this year.
The cost of pumpkin, however, had had variations that resulted in a decrease in total hectares planted, he said.
"This had an impact on the cost of sales, as producers decided to lower its price for the customers of Sonora, which is one of the main markets for pumpkin," he said.
Source: The diario.mx