One of the final actions of the Biden administration's USDA included an allocation of $129.2 million from the Commodity Credit Corporation to the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service to help prevent the spread of exotic fruit flies – both domestic and in Mexico and Guatemala.
California Citrus Mutual thanked the agency and former Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack for prioritizing the concern, citing the economic impacts of larvae infestations, increased costs of pest management and restrictions on selling infected fruit.
APHIS is reported to have responded to increased domestic outbreaks, enabling the agency to work with state, local and international partners to improve surveillance systems and repair sterile insect facilities in California and Texas.
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Last year, APHIS decisions to withdraw in-person inspection by U.S. officials in Mexican avocado orchards and authorize avocado imports from Guatemala frustrated the California Avocado Commission, which claimed the agency reversed a decades-long agreement with no negotiation. They wrote to Agriculture Secretary-nominee Brooke Rollins on Monday, asking her to reinstall original safeguards in Mexico as soon as possible.
The commission's primary pest concern is stem weevils, a type of beetle, rather than fruit flies.
