Winfresh suspends purchase of bananas from Dominica

Winfresh (UK) Ltd, the fruit importer and distributor, has suspended the purchase of bananas from Dominican farmers because of the quality of the fruit being shipped from the island, the President of the National Fair Trade Organization (NFTA), Charles Watty was quoted in CMC report published in the Jamaica Observer.

According to CMC, Watty said that over the past few weeks, Winfresh has been concerned about the quality of the fruit and the fact that Dominica does not have a proper management of the Black Sigatoka, a leaf-spot disease of banana plants caused by the ascomycete fungus Mycosphaerella fijiensis.

"As a result of that you have uneven ripening of the fruits. So as a result of that during the course of December, Winfresh has suspended all the core farmers of Dominica …and as a result you only find yourself shipping just about roughly two pallets of bananas.

"But we have been working with the officials from Winfresh on the ground in Dominica to get these farmers reinstated at the earliest possible opportunity," he said.