In the 2017/2018 season, the National Service for Agrifood Health and Quality (SENASA) inspected and certified the export of 490 tons of cherries for the USA and 200 tons to Canada through the ports of southern Patagonia, i.e. 10% more than was sent in the previous season.
The Southern Patagonia region exports its cherries under a pre-shipment inspection program that allows inspecting the fruit at its origin before it's shipped to the United States, without quarantine treatment for fruit fly control, since the United States Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (USDA-APHIS) certified that the area was free of fruit fly in December 2005.
The Work Plan for the pre-shipment program at origin, to the US, from fruit fly-free areas in Argentina contains the guidelines for the sampling, inspection, safekeeping, and issuance of documents for the export of fresh cherries from the Patagonia and the center and south of Mendoza.
The inspection and control tasks exercised by Senasa in the region are: The sampling of 2% of the product to be exported, identifying and sampling the pallets, signing and verifying the accompanying documentation (i.e. the documents identifying the batch and sampled lot), and issuing the Vegetal Transit Document (DTV).
Senasa also participates in the export of cherries to Canada, with an operative procedure under the system of integrated measures for the Lobesia botrana, certifying packaging and productive establishments, as well as in the dispatch of the lots to be exported.
The fruits sent to the aforementioned destinations are produced in the localities of Gaiman and Sarmiento, in the province of Chubut, and in Los Antiguos, in the province of Santa Cruz.
Source: diariocronica.com.ar