Costa Rica: Flooding washes out banana, pineapple fields
Bananas are Costa Rica’s single most important agricultural export worth over $900 million in exports annually, according to PROCOMER. Jorge Sauma, general manager of the National Banana Corporation, CORBANA, said that banana production has already seen a 10 percent drop in production since this time last year because of higher than normal rainfall. The CORBANA manager said he did not have an estimate on the number of hectares affected. Setbacks in production from flooding in June could push exports down 15 or 20 percent, he said.
Besides the volume of bananas exported, the yellow fruit is an important employer in rural areas. Sauma said that the banana industry directly employs more than 40,000 workers and another 100,000 indirectly. Pineapple directly employs 26,000 people, according to National Chamber of Pineapple Producers (CANAPEP) President Abel Chávez.
Chávez said that roughly 28,000 hectares of pineapples fields have been damaged as a result of flooding across the Caribbean area. The CANAPEP president said pineapples in the fields might not be eligible for export because of water damage that discolors the fruit’s interior.
Before last month’s flooding, both fruits were already seeing lower than normal exports. Chávez said that pineapple exports were down 14 percent from last year as of April. Bananas were down 23 percent, according to a report from the Foreign Trade Ministry.
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