Another Belizean product is about to be exported to Guatemala, through the stewardship of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security.
A trade agreement between the Belizean company, Cayo Grain & Agro. Supply Limited, and the Guatemalan chapter of Maseca company, will allow for over 400 metric tons of Belizean yellow corn to be exported to our neighbor to the west.
It's an important restart of trade of this commodity under the Partial Scope Agreement, and today, the Government invited the press to observe the preparation of the first shipment.
Our news team was in Cayo today, and Daniel Ortiz reports:
This morning, 3 massive trucks pulled up to the corn storage facility on the compound of the Cayo Grain and Agro Supply Company. Massive quantities of yellow corn, all grown in Belize, were then offloaded in preparation for a shipment that is about to leave the country.
This marks the first step in a trade agreement between this Belizean grain company and the Guatemalan chapter of the corn flour company, Maseca. When this specific transaction is completed, 180 metric tons of corn will have been exported across the western border.
Gilbert Canton Jr. - GM, Cayo Grain & Agro Supply Ltd.
"About 3 weeks ago, Maseca reached out and said they had a need for corn, we said we have corn. Last week, they confirmed an order of 180 metric tons of yellow corn and 324 metric tons of white corn, so the truck that was loaded a while ago, that's the first of the yellow corn that going out and over the next 2 weeks we'll be loading out the rest of the yellow and white corn, all across the border to Melchor and then on to Guatemala City to Maseca's Plant."
Alvaro Rodriguez - Rep, Diversa
"I represent Diversa and Diversa have a contract with Maseca and that's why we're here on a very exciting day this morning. We're very excited to say that we were able through our representation to convince the mills at Maseca to come and buy Belizean corn, this has happened in the past but it was dormant for a long time, so we were able to convince them and we can see it today is our first load, it's 5 containers of yellow corn going down to Guatemala's mill, 3 more of white corn are going next week and we just got an order from the Honduras Maseca mill, so it's pretty promising and we want to do a long term pricing that will benefit all the Belizean farmers."
That surge of interest in corn produced in Belize, partly comes from confirmation that the commodity is of very high quality.
Gilbert Canton Jr.
"We went through a process of sending samples to Guatemala to see if our corn qualifies, the results came back very good."
Alvaro Rodriguez
"We were pretty excited to see the results because we did sampling that were sent to the Maseca labs and the sampling came out with an excellent result for human consumption even though most of the Belizean corn is being produced for animal feed, we still have the quality as it is right now and it can only improve an excellent production rate and milling rate."
Hon. Jose Mai - Minister of Agriculture, Food Security & Enterprise
"We have good farmers in this country, we have excellent quality corn, this corn out today is grade 1 using the USDA grading system, grade 1 corn. The other corn that comes into Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras from the US is not grade 1."
From the perspective of the Agriculture Minister, the reactivation of this trade route is yet another step in the move to increase Belizean exports, one commodity at a time.
Hon. Jose Mai
"We know that the largest importer of corn in the region is Guatemala in Central America. In North America the largest importer of corn is Mexico, they have populations that consume corn 3 times a day, we have a small population of 380,000 of which 50% is Hispanic, 50% is other and therefore our corn consumption is not as great as Central American. We are doing well in advancing trade to Central America and Mexico, Mexico is 123 million people, with that, you don't want to trade with anybody else, that's all you want, Guatemala is 18 million people, El Salvador is 6 million people, so I think does Belize well to do everything it possibly can to expand our trade relationships with these countries."
