The quarantine imposed in Chimbarongo forces exporters who want to send their products to assume new costs to comply with international regulations.
The worst scenario for fruit exporters in the region was confirmed, the Agricultural and Livestock Service (SAG) detected two new specimens of fruit flies in the urban sector of the commune of Chimbarongo, the same place where it was detected at the beginning of April. a wild and fertile male in a fig tree in the area.
After this outbreak, a campaign to eradicate this pest began by the SAG, declaring a quarantine in a radius of 27.2 km, as required by Chinese importers, where the specimens were found, seeking to reduce the impact on agricultural and livestock properties. the neighbors.
Eric Guital, regional director of the Agricultural and Livestock Service, commented that “trapping, soil treatment and application of sterile insects are being carried out from where these insects were found, until reaching the end of the radius.”
Regarding the extension of the quarantine zone, the director explained that “the distances are, because they are regulations of the destination market, the 7.2 km is for the United States and most of the closest Western markets, while the 27.2 km is the quarantine zone or internal regulation that China requests, therefore, within that framework we act, according to the requirements established by the destination countries.”
The regional director of SAG commented that these activities will be extended until February of next year, and the number of traps in that area, house-to-house sampling of fruit trees, as well as soil treatment and the release of that of the sterile insect in the area.
To export, the condition requested by the health authorities of the United States and China is that the fruits undergo a cold treatment, which according to Guital “generates an additional cost, but if the exporter wants to send their products they will have to.” to do”.
The 27.2 km radius that was established by the health authority also affects the production of farmers in the Maule region, and that is why the Seremi of Agriculture of that region, Claudia Ramos, participated in the round table. work that was carried out on Friday, May 3, and commented that “today we have almost all the fruits harvested, we are with kiwi and apples, the rest of the fruits have already come out. And what the Maule has done, along with supporting what is being done in the O’Higgins region, is to increase the number of traps because it has a program that is constant, and it was increased by 15%, in order to detect at any time and in time, to eradicate it.”
