Minister Manzano will denounce in the Prosecutor’s Office that the MAG was listed as a banana producer

The Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock (MAG) was listed as a banana producer. It had 20,000 hectares registered in the Unibanano Banana Control System. They are virtual hectares, not physical, that were registered with a code, based on which the fruit could be exported illegally.

This was revealed by the Minister of Agriculture and Livestock, Bernardo Manzano, who will file the respective complaint with the State Attorney General’s Office, after learning of this fact. “It was registered with 20,000 hectares of bananas; it had 60 boxes per hectare, which gives a fictitious 1.2 million boxes per week, that is, 14% of the country’s exports”, denounced the Minister.

It was discovered as part of the process that, in order to make the procedures transparent, the current administration began in the Unibanano Banana Control System. “We discovered it last week and this week the case will be presented to the Prosecutor’s Office,” added the Minister.

Through a statement, the State portfolio indicated that the respective investigations will be carried out to determine who registered the MAG as a producer and when it was carried out. The Comptroller will also be asked to initiate a special investigation.

Manzano, who took office at the beginning of May 2022, affirmed that this discovery was made during the audit work that the entity carries out on the banana production chain to make the processes transparent.

The Minister affirmed that this demonstrates the vulnerability of the Unibanano System, which could be manipulated from outside the Institution. For this reason, he reiterated the need to modernize this system, because “it has been violated from all sides.”

In this context, Manzano announced that the terms of reference are ready to contract an efficient control system, which will allow knowing who registers banana producers and when.