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Mexico: avocado orchards are affected by climate change

Climate change has been exacerbated by land use change from forest to avocado, it is impacting negatively the orchards of this fruit, acknowledged the Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources, Juan Rafael Elvira Quesada, who pointed out that the forest is what dampens the climate change.

In Michoacán there are more than 100 hectares of the main agricultural export product, generating an output of one million tons annually. 80% of the orchards are located in rain-fed land.

Juan Elvira was concerned about illegal changes in land use because "this phenomenon continues", and said he believed that "the number 1 enemy of avocado in the Michoacán area has been precisely the climate change".

He explained that "there has been more frost than expected and heat waves in March, April and May have caused the abortion of most of the flowering of avocado. This is an indicator of the natural limits of the avocado planting".

From January 1^st to May 15^th, the Michoacan delegation of the Federal Environmental Protection Attorney (Profepa), has started in the Meseta P'urhépecha alone 7 cases by changing of land use. The outcome of these procedures is to turn them to the General Attorney of the Republic.

Juan Elvira said that about 7,700 producers in the entity are paying the consequences of environmental consequences of land use change from forest to avocado.

He noted that producers "have been having problems for 2 consecutive years in the production of avocado both from heat waves or extreme cold. It is a very clear indicator to put an end to this phenomenon (the change of land use)".

He stressed that "we must remember that the stripping of forest and woodlands are precisely the ones that most mitigate the effects of climate change".

Source: Cambiodemichoacan

Publication date: 6/28/2011

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