Government to Cense Banana Planters

Banana law for 2011 will regularize illegal banana plantations, establish fixed prices for the entire year, strengthen penalties for exporters who fail to pay the official price of the box of the fruit, among other actions.

Richard Salazar, Banana Unit director from the Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries Ministry (Magap), said yesterday that the reforms will help the industry because “there are currently 110 000 hectares of illegal banana plantations, which represent 115 million cases per year and it means that half of fruit exports is not legalized.”

Producers that want to be legalized must approach to the Agricultural Secretariat to fill out a form indicating the amount of land they own in order to begging their legalization process next year.

The minimum support price for the fruit will be fixed by Magap through a negotiating table, but it is currently working as well on a regulation for the establishment of one price for high season and another for the low one, which will be set up in December.

Source: El Universo Newspaper