California avocado growers are sounding the alarm over a potential infiltration of crop pests from across the border after the Biden administration caved to Mexican cartel threats and ended a Clinton-era food inspection process that now threatens U.S. farmers.
“We understand the importance of free trade,” Ken Melban, the vice president of industry affairs and operations at the California Avocado Commission, told Fox Digital in a Tuesday Zoom interview. “Eight-five to 90% of the total U.S. demand for avocados is supplied by Mexico. However, that free trade should not increase risk on our California growers.”
“Our growers are working hard to maintain a business, to drive their economic engine, to provide for their families, to support the economies around them,” he said. “And they shouldn’t have to face a pest, no fault of their own, just because our government in the past was afraid to stand up to the cartel.”
Melban was reacting to a Biden administration decision in September 2024 to end a U.S. Department of Agriculture program called the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) specifically in the context of inspecting farms in Mexico to ensure that avocados exported to the U.S. did not also include pests that could disrupt U.S. agriculture. The policy change came after criminals in Mexico reportedly assaulted and threatened the inspectors in recent years.
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Fruit boxes with avocados are pictured during harvest at an orchard in the municipality of Uruapan, Michoacan State, Mexico. (Getty Images)
Instead, Mexico was charged with ensuring avocados sent across the border were free of harmful pests, such as seed and stem weevils and seed moths. Weevils are small insects that typically have long snouts, and are notorious for damaging or destroying crops.
The avocado industry is a multibillion business in Mexico, but it is often rocked by crime and…
