Venezuela rules out the presence of 'Fusarium' in the country

Venezuela's National Institute of Integral Agricultural Health (Insai) has ruled out the presence of Fusarium oxysporum f. sp cubense Tropical Race 4 (Foc RT4) in Venezuelan banana plantations. “Insai, an entity attached to (MIPPAPT) –the Ministry of Popular Power for Productive Land Agriculture– ratifies and informs the international scientific community and agricultural actors that the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela is free of Foc R4T,” the organization pointed out in its Twitter account.

In addition, Insai published a guide so that Venezuelan producers were aware of this disease's symptoms so they could detect the fungus in their plantations.

For now, the only confirmed presences of the plague in the region have been in Colombia (August 2019) and, more recently, in Peru, at the beginning of last April. On April 27, Ecuador's Phytosanitary and Zoosanitary Regulation and Control Agency (Agrocalidad) reiterated that the country was free of Fusarium Race 4 and that they had reinforced controls to prevent the fungus from entering the country, the largest banana exporter in the region.