The Valencian Association of Farmers (AVA-ASAJA) and the Association of Avocado Producers (ASOPROA) ask both food distribution chains and consumers themselves to give priority to local avocados – the Lamb Hass variety is currently in season , the most cultivated in Valencian lands–, a permanent claim that gains special strength after learning of the detection of three health alerts so far this year due to excessive levels of residues in batches of avocados from Peru.
Both organizations denounce that “foreign imports of avocados are displacing and leaving little marketing space for European fruit that does meet the maximum guarantees of sustainability and food safety.”
“If we want to fight climate change, let’s start by giving priority to those local products that have a lower carbon footprint, and then, as a complement, when there is not enough own production, bet on other origins.
What does not make sense is to replace an avocado picked from the tree to the table with another that accumulates forty days of travel by boat and also, in some cases, food safety violations, “they have stated.
Likewise, these entities verify that the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) has recorded three interceptions in 2022 of shipments of avocados originating in Peru with levels of substances that exceed the Maximum Residue Limits (MRL) allowed in the European Union . Even in some cases it is organic avocados, so the notification reaches the consideration of “serious”.
For this reason, AVA-ASAJA and ASOPROA insist on “calling for the unity of the entire sector -producers, marketers, distributors and administrations- in order to promote a strategy aimed at differentiating Spanish and European avocados from imports on the rise that do not they offer the same guarantees to consumers, even though they are an excellent deal for importers’.
