Jose Ceralde
13 Dec 2007

 

 

Mr. John Bolinas,

My family enjoyed our trip last Labor Day in Toronto, Canada. We went to Chinatown and bought lansones, caimito, durian, pantol, tamarindo, and guapple (guava apple). Really had a gastromic exercise since we do not even see most of these fruits here in the US.

Our custom agricultural regulations are night and day with Canada. My sister-in-law tried to sneak through the US border a few lansones in her pocket and it was painful to the tune of $400.00.

Milkfish importation into the US is also going through the growing pains. The flux of market demand sometimes present dealers with short supply of bangus from Pangasinan. But it had been filled from the big exporters from Sarrangani. Although Bonuan bangus buyers could spot the differences.

Is Pangasinan mangoes the only one approved? But the problem with strict export quality and inspection in the ports still continues and dealt with by each importer. The positive impact of branding milkfish still had to be seen.

Transportation cost continues to be a big hurdle. Hopefully with strong US exports to Asia it will make cargo ship offloading their goods with cheap space to fill their hulls of exports from the Philippines. It would be great if the mangoes exporters talk to their bangus counterparts on how they overcame some common processes so they could bring in the mangoes to the USA.