The Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Aquaculture and Fisheries (Magap) announced that the decision will be made and once they have the census results in late January, they will proceed with the conversion of banana crops and impose sanctions, to persons who have planted without the proper permit.
The zone 5 coordinator of Magap, Carlos Velez, said that actions taken for producers who have exceeded the limits will be those required by the law. "The banana sector does not allow more hectares of fruit, the measure is to control the increases of illegal plantations or cultivated hectares."
According to data from January 2011, Ecuador has 230,000 hectares of banana, of which 170,000 are enrolled, ie 75% of the total, the other 25% does not have permission.
The President, Rafael Correa, said there is a need to reduce the number of banana producers and hectares, because there is an excessive loss of production and quality of the fruit. "One of the problems of the banana market is that we have about 12,000 banana producers (no Latin American country has so many) with few exporters," said the president.
Leonardo Justo, of the Producers Association of Ventanas, Los Ríos, reported that on the Coast there are new banana plantations that are illegal. "The country has an overproduction that affects prices, but surprisingly in the new coastal province, Santa Elena, there are even new export banana plantations," he said.
Source: Telegrafo