And we took those complaints to the Ministry of Agriculture, where the Director of Extension Services explained that they are trying to ensure that the local farmers can sell their produce rather than saturate the market with Mexican carrots. He explained that they stand by the producers, but they understand the marketplace concerns and will be investigating the matter. However, the vendors will have to stop waiting for that importation license because the local carrots are here to stay. Here's how he put it.
Clifford Martinez - Ministry of Agriculture
"When you do look what is coming out of our current production, it is indeed a quality that is considered average as a technical person speaking and from the technical arm of the ministry, these carrots were assets, we visited the fields 2 weeks ago, and it was at an average height, average weight, average quality and so sufficient to say, we are satisfied with saying it's an average quality comparing it to Mexican carrot would be unfair and unreasonable. In terms of the amount that's available, remember, we did put out a release 2 weeks ago that the first time in the past 7-8 years, that we're getting carrots in early October, this has never happened before, so with the push and the advances of the extension service and the ministry of agriculture that we've been able to identify the sort of varieties that can tolerate the heat, water stress and also meet the average quality that is required by the domestic market. So the ministry is satisfied in what is available, we have to highlight however that we're not in the carping season and there seems to be some issues of post harvest handling that might be what we need to address and that is because after harvesting, washing of the product and packaging and then transportation, we need to take into consideration humidity, heat, and then they way it's packaged/stored and then delivered to the first buyer and then later on sold to consumers. Our follow up steps will see us visiting the market outlets because we know where the carrots are coming from, there's only one zone the carrots are coming from and if it's not from that zone then we need to track and see how it is that this carrot is being used or the quality of the carrot is being compromised and them we're blaming local farmers when in reality it might be an issue of handling and storage. The carrot that's in the market at the moment, in a matter of 2 days the second production is going to come out of San Carlos and so what we're seeing is the reduction in the availability that was supplied a week ago and then now you'll see new amounts coming out on Sunday actually."
Martinez said this Saturday and Sunday will be harvest days for the carrots.
