| Customs Wants to Keep Contraband Potatoes Out Of Market |
| Fri, January 26, 2018 |
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Earlier this week we told you how the Ministry of Agriculture won't be issuing any import permits for potatoes until the local supply of 3.7 million pounds is depleted.
But that doesn't necessarily mean that farmers will get the price they are hoping for at the market. And that's because there's always a wild card in the deck, and it's contraband. Every day, dories come across the Rio Hondo River in northern Belize loaded with sacks of onions, cabbage, potatoes and sweet peppers.
Today the Comptroller of Customs told us that their enforcement remains active in the north - and they will even go into the marketplace to weed out contraband produce:...
Colin Griffith, Comptroller of Customs
"The situation with potato or any contraband, it is our department that continues to function and as I mentioned in my speech we work with all of the other enforcement agencies. With agricultural produce, for customs to have a strong case we actually have to meet those goods being brought in illegally. If that doesn't occur, we have to rely on the expertise of BAHA to identify whether or not that produce was grown locally or imported."
Under the terms agreed to with the Ministry of Agriculture, both wholesalers and producers will have access to sell directly to the market.
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