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 Editorials | Environmental | November 2005 
Mexico Steps Up Control Over Imports of Foreign Christmas Trees
 Ioan Grillo - Associated Press
Mexico is stepping up control over imports of American and Canadian Christmas trees to avoid foreign plant bugs, the Environmental Department said Friday.
Nearly 100 special inspectors will be positioned along Mexico's 2,000-mile (3,200-kilometer) border with the United States, scrutinizing the leaves and branches of the 800,000 Christmas trees it expects to flow south this season, said Hector Gonzalez, Assistant Attorney General of Natural Resources.
"We have to protect our rich forests and woodlands from exotic plagues," Gonzalez said.
Any trees found with disease will be turned back or burned, he said.
Officials said they are particularly concerned about plants with infections of Gypsy Moths and Pine Shoot Beetles.
Last Christmas, border inspectors said they found a truckload of 800 trees from Clackamas, Oregon, that were infected with a stem weevil known by the Latin name Cylindrocopturus.
However, some growers north of the border say the Mexican inspections are unnecessary because there are rigid controls inside the United States.
"Every American Christmas tree is thoroughly checked before it is cut and leaves the farm," said Bill Dennis, president of the Iowa-based Captain Jack's Christmas Tree Farm Network, which represents 500 growers.
Mexico's own blossoming Christmas tree market is worth an estimated US$500 million (euro430 million).
About 40 percent of the trees sold here are grown by an increasing number of government-subsidized Mexican producers. Starting in 1997, the Agriculture Department began giving farmers about US$240 (euro205) each along with free seedlings of local fir varieties such as oyamel and acahuite.
"Growing Christmas trees is a good environmentally friendly activity for Mexican farmers," said Alejandro Noguez, Assistant Attorney General for Forest Regulation and Control.
The government hopes that Mexican farmers will eventually dominate the local market and then start exporting to the United States, Noguez said.
Mexican Christmas trees sell for up to half the price of the American and Canadian imports, he said.
Officials said that 200 inspectors will also be visiting markets across Mexico to check tree sellers' documents. Smugglers try and sneak foreign Christmas trees over the border to avoid import taxes, they said.
The inspectors also will attempt to ensure that Mexican trees have been grown at legal farms. Up to 10 percent of Mexican Christmas trees are poached from protected areas by criminal loggers, Gonzalez said.
Anyone found selling these illegally logged trees will be fined up to US$80,000 (euro68,400), he said.
"To protect Mexico's environment, we going to use the full weight of the law," he said. |
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