On Ecuador's Pacific coast, banana grower Franklin Torres is monitoring all activity every morning to make sure the fruit meets international beauty standards. However, more importantly, he will check whether the fruit packed for shipment, free of cocaine.
Torres is hypervigilant because Ecuador is increasingly at the confluence of two global trades: bananas and cocaine. The South American country is the world’s largest exporter of bananas, shipping about 6.5 million tons a year by sea. It is also wedged between the world’s largest cocaine producers, Peru and Colombia, and drug traffickers find containers filled with bananas the perfect vehicle to smuggle their product.
Drug traffickers’ infiltration of the industry that is responsible for about 30% of the world’s bananas has contributed to unprecedented violence across this once-peaceful nation.
Source: sandiegouniontribune.com
