Mexico Considers Importing Avocados as Staple Priced Out of Consumers’ Reach David Agren - The Guardian
go to original August 10, 2017

Workers pack avocados at a warehouse of La Joya de los Magueyes plantation in Tancitaro, in Michoacan state, Mexico (Reuters)

The growing global appetite for avocados has been blamed for a litany of sorrows, from self-inflicted stab wounds to stopping young people from buying their own homes.

But in Mexico, the world’s biggest producer, what used to be a dietary staple is now too expensive for many ordinary consumers. And, now the country where the avocado is believe to have originated is considering the unthinkable: importing avocados from abroad.

“It seems laughable, being able to bring in avocados from other areas at a time when we are so successful in exporting [avocados] … but we’re not ruling it out,” said economy secretary Ildefonso Guajardo. “It’s practically the price of success. Avocados are so popular on the international level that it’s generating price pressure in the national market.”

Avocados are believed to have first been cultivated in the Mexican state of Puebla, and they have become big business for the country, which accounts for almost half the world’s production.

Government statistics show avocado exports now bring more money into the country than petroleum.

Many towns have grown wealthy on the so-called “green gold” – which has also been blamed for a spate of illegal deforestation in the country.

Read the rest at The Guardian

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