Mexico Inaugurates the National Phytosanitary Reference Center

The Mexican Secretariat of Agriculture, Livestock, Rural Development, Fisheries and Food (SAGARPA), inaugurated the National Phytosanitary Reference Center, an important tool for protecting the country's agricultural heritage. 

 

The Center, which cost nearly 400 million Peso, is the only one of its kind in Latin America.

 

During the inauguration of the facilities, Flavio Antonio Diaz Miron, the Chief of Staff of SAGARPA, which belongs to the National Health Service, Food Safety and Quality (SENASICA), said the Center was of great importance because it would help preserve the country's most important public good: human health.

 

Miron spoke on behalf of the head of SAGARPA, Jose Calzada, and said that these were the kind of instruments that had allowed Mexico to position itself as a producer and exporter of food. Miron also said he was certain that the future would be better. He said the country's current agricultural food products were certified, healthier, safer, and had a higher quality than 23 years ago, when the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed.

 

In turn, the chief director of SENASICA, Enrique Sanchez Cruz, said he was proud of this National Center, which has eight laboratories equipped with the latest technology where world-class technicians would work to safeguard and promote the country's agricultural activity. He also said the National Government had been working in recent years to create efficient infrastructure to diagnose pests and agricultural diseases, where Mexican technicians could sequence viruses and bacteria, and could have a bank of pathogens that affected the national field so they could investigate them.

 

This infrastructure, and the country's valuable human capital, have allowed Mexico to show the world it is doing a good job in health and food safety, which has allowed the country to be a top competitor in international markets. 

 

Meanwhile, Alejandro Vazquez Salido, the chief director of the Service Agency for the Marketing and Development of Agricultural Markets (ASERCA), said his job was to position Mexican agricultural products in the domestic and international markets, which would be impossible without the work of SENASICA.

 

The SAGARPA official asked institutions to work together with SENASICA so that Mexico and the world get to know the country's strength as a producer of tasty, healthy, and safe food. The chief executive officer of Plant Health of SENASICA, Francisco Javier Trujillo Arriaga, said the Center would employ more than 150 technicians committed to plant health. He also said this activity had evolved in recent years and had earned the respect and recognition of Mexico and the world.

 

The Center is located in the unit of Integral Services, Diagnosis and Verification of SENASICA in Tecamac, the State of Mexico. It consists of five buildings that have eight laboratories, a greenhouse, a quarantine treatment area, a powerhouse, and a building to collect insects and mites that affect the country's agriculture.

 

This Center has also strengthened the National Plant Epidemiological Surveillance System; the National Animal and Plant Health Inspection System, and the Program for Export of plant products, and particularly the avocado. 

 

It will support Product Systems, various programs of SAGARPA, the Plant Health State Committees, the associations of agricultural producers, and will provide training for technicians from across the country and Latin America.