Fruit traders in Afghanistan call for international market access
Fresh Fruits and Vegetables Traders' National Union head, Akhtar Mohammad Ahmadi, told reporters on the sidelines of the gathering: 'This year, most of the fresh fruit got rotten either at warehouses or in fields due to a lack of market for them on national and international levels.'
'Everyone buys fresh fruit, but our farmers sell them at meagre prices inside the country and often incur losses.'
Keeping in view transport fares, municipality taxes and labor cost, farmers ended up in debt, he said, adding that currently a limited amount of fresh fruits were exported to India, Qatar, and the UAE.
Ahmadi asked the Afghan government to come up with a long-term plan for supporting domestic products and preventing imports of identical foreign products; otherwise, gardeners and traders would witness more losses.
source: menafn.com
