China raises quarantine measures for three regions of Chile for fruit fly

China raises quarantine measures for three regions of Chile per fruit fly

15/09/2015

The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of the People's Republic of China (AQSIQ) notified its Chilean counterpart of the lifting of quarantine restrictions for regions where occasional fruit fly events occur.

In practice, and as detailed by the Association of Fruit Exporters of Chile (ASOEX), the measure benefits the regions of Coquimbo, Valparaíso and Metropolitan, as it will avoid the application of quarantine treatments and their direct costs to export grape, blueberry , apple, kiwi and plum to the Asian giant.

Furthermore, the export of Hass avocados from important productive areas that until now could not participate due to the quarantine restrictions for this species is allowed.

From now on, a quarantine radius of 27,2 kilometers is defined before an outbreak of the insect and not of the total of the region, as it operated until now.

"A couple of days ago, China has officially informed us that it has adopted a procedure to safeguard the health issues that are of interest to it, which gradually adapts to international regulations. The consequence of this is that we have, from now on, opened the Chinese market for all our products, "said the Minister of Agriculture of Chile, Carlos Furche, during a visit to the Exportadora Santa Cruz where the news was made public. .

The representative of the Chilean agro said that although the Chinese market was already open for several products, "now this particularly favors avocados, which was our main concern."

"Our exports of avocados have today as a fundamental destination the European Union and the US, but I think it is very good news for our producers and exporters that the Chinese market opens under very favorable conditions," said Furche.

From the side of the export sector, Ronald Bown, president of ASOEX highlighted the opportunities that the news brings, especially for the avocado due to the complex restrictions to export to China, "which is solved, promoting the shipment of higher volumes of fruit".

Meanwhile, the general manager of Exportadora Santa Cruz, Javier Fuchslocher, said that "although the avocado is not of basic consumption in China, we believe that its growth will be gradual. Today in China 20 and 30 consume weekly containers of avocado and this could multiply by ten soon. "

For his part, the National Director of the Agricultural and Livestock Service of Chile (SAG), Ángel Sartori, said that "this is a topic of the utmost importance, since from the point of view of the national economy, it opens enormous business possibilities for our producers. "

He also pointed out that the SAG will have to make new efforts, "since it will be necessary to negotiate new modifications to the protocols currently in force, to incorporate productive areas of apple and kiwi that were not incorporated by the restrictions imposed by fruit fly quarantine, task to the one that we will promptly deal with ".

Source: Fruit Portal