Plantain producers of the Pacific Center of Mexico are moving forward their plan to diversify markets and hope to reach China by 2018, with the export of two million boxes of this fruit.
"We are taking firm steps in the consolidation of our exports and I believe that there is a good business opportunity because China offers us good prices," said Adrian Prats Leal, the president of the National Council of Plantain Producers.
He also stated that Mexico, through the National Service of Health, Safety and Agri-Food Quality (Senasica), and China were working on a phytosanitary protocol for this product and that it should be achieved this year, as a Chinese technical team have already visited the crops of Colima, Michoacan, Jalisco, Chiapas and Tabasco.
"They were very satisfied with the conditions of our plantations", Prats Leal said in an interview, indicating that the authorities of both countries were working in technical adjustments and that, afterwards, they would have conversations on the export quota for the Mexican product.
He also stated that this would open a wide range of opportunities for producers, especially from the Central Pacific region of Mexico, because the fruit will be exported through the commercial port of Manzanillo, which is considered one of the most important ports because of the volume of cargo that it manages.
In addition, Prats Leal said that the Chinese market would also be an alternative to the current commercial situation with the United States, as protectionist measures have been imposed on the agricultural sector in the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). .
The proposal suggests that Mexican producers would have to pay a tax to export their products, or be forbidden from exporting them, when the United States is harvesting said product.
Prats Leal said that they were also keeping track of the discussions of the trade agreement with the European Union, as it is a region to which they sent between three and four million boxes in 2017 and that has an ample potential for them to place their fruit.
Source: Notimex