Death threats and more than 50 million dollars in losses: the black week of the Mexican avocado

The United States was preparing last week for the Super Bowl —the planetary sporting spectacle and consumption of guacamole— without being aware that more than 2,700 kilometers to the south, a phone call was going to turn the market for the precious fruit upside down. would consume in bulk: avocado, green gold Mexican. An American health inspector began to receive insults and death threats against him and his family. The agent, based in the town of Uruapan, in the state of Michoacán, had dared to question the integrity of a shipment of avocados and deny the necessary certificate for extradition. That threat made somewhere in the Tierra Caliente region and the Purépecha plateau was enough for the United States government to close its border to Mexican avocados.

The United States was blunt in the face of threats: it suspended avocado imports until the Mexican authorities were unable to guarantee security in an area where such a thing is usually a chimera. The order, issued on February 11, stopped the packing machines, the shipments to be exported remained as inventory and the more than 15,000 fruit cutters in the fields of Michoacán returned home. The United States did not give in: not one more box would enter until its inspectors were certain that organized crime would not threaten them again. Mexico thus lost its main commercial client, a partner that demands more than 80% of Mexican avocado exports, equivalent to more than one million tons per year and profits of more than 3,000 million dollars.

Michoacán —which in Nahuatl means place of fish— is the only state that has been certified to export avocados to the United States for 25 years. The entity, with 4.7 million inhabitants, has been marked by poverty, migration and shipments of the so-called green gold “on the other side”, therefore, its economic destiny, whether through remittances or exports, has been closely linked to the dollar. Paradoxically, the fertile land of avocados is also a disputed area between drug cartels.

The producers recognize that such a buoyant business for the Michoacan countryside has attracted the eyes of organized crime. If a decade ago a flat fee was paid to the Familia Michoacana or to the Knights Templar, now it is Los Viagras or the Jalisco New Generation Cartel who are extorting, kidnapping and threatening. The impunity with which the cartels operate in the avocado zone —made up of some 60 municipalities— has even led to the emergence of groups of armed civilians to try to tear from the clutches of the drug trafficker the coveted fruit of the crops.

The US trade blockade put the federal government, the state of Michoacán and the producers on the ropes. At first, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador assured that beyond insecurity, behind this suspension there were political and economic interests. “There are other countries interested in selling avocados,” he declared at the National Palace, while the US Department of Agriculture replied that imports of the fruit would remain paralyzed “as long as necessary.”

Away from the spotlight and behind closed doors, both sides of the border rushed negotiations. With the urgency of reopening this important source of income, the Mexican authorities presented a security strategy to the United States in the middle of the week. The emergency plan promises the creation of an intelligence and surveillance unit in the main municipalities that produce Michoacán and the security guarantee for the nearly 70 North American inspectors who verify the product sent to the other side of the northern border.

After seven days of uncertainty, lobbying and a balance, according to producers, of up to 50 million dollars in losses, the US reactivated Mexican avocado imports this Friday. “I thank you for working with my security colleagues at the United States Embassy to enact measures to ensure the safety of our APHIS inspectors. [Departamento de Inspección Sanitaria en EE UU] in the field,” said Ken Salazar, the US ambassador to Mexico. Both authorities and farmers welcomed the resumption of shipments.

Juan Carlos Anaya, director of the Agricultural Markets Consulting Group (GCMA) celebrates the resumption of exports. However, he points out that now the challenge will be to confirm that the emergency operation outlined by Mexico guarantees security throughout the chain, from production, through the transportation and packaging of the avocado. “The reality is that we are complementary, we send them [a EE UU] a lot of fruit, vegetables, sugar, but they send us a lot of corn, soybeans, wheat, beef, chicken,” he says.

The researcher from the Universidad Michoacana Benjamín Revuelta adds that in addition to curbing insecurity in the area, environmental control is required on overexploited avocado lands. According to his analysis, 80% of the avocado orchards in the State are illegal because they do not comply with the permit and the criteria of the environmental authorities. The specialist adds that Michoacán is being invaded by the euphoria of the big avocado business at the expense of ecological balance. “We have to preserve the avocado industry, but we have to do it properly because if we don’t, they will impose a veto or a sanction on us from abroad,” he says.

Although the commercial break has been overcome, for the time being, with the permission of the United States, violence continues to be a pending issue in Michoacán. The death threat to an American inspector is added to other postcards of horror in the State: antipersonnel mines, drone attacks, bodies abandoned in ditches or hanging from bridges at any time of the day. A trail of blood that, according to what was signed this Friday by the Mexican authorities, will not cross the thousands of hectares dedicated to the planting and harvesting of avocados.

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