GUAYAQUIL, Ecuador—Men walk through a lush plantation between Ecuador ‘s balmy Pacific coast and its majestic Andes, lopping hundreds of bunches of green bananas from groaning plants twice their height. Workers haul the bunches to an assembly line, where the bananas are washed, weighed and plastered with stickers for European…
Recently harvested bananas are washed at a farm in Los Rios, Ecuador on August 15, 2023. Bananas headed to a commercial port must meet long-established beauty standards of the export market.
The South American country is the world’s largest exporter of bananas, shipping about 6.5 million metric tons a year by sea. It is also wedged between the world’s largest cocaine producers, Peru and Colombia, and drug traffickers find containers filled with bananas the perfect vehicle to smuggle their product.
In addition to its proximity to cocaine production, cartels from Mexico, Colombia and the Balkans have settled in Ecuador because it uses the US dollar and has weak laws and institutions, along with a network of long-established gangs like Los Choneros that are eager for work. Bananas headed to Europe are boxed at plantations, loaded into trucks that take them to massive warehouses in and around Guayaquil and transferred to maritime containers driven to an area port.
Other traffickers have corrupted or intimidated police, customs agents, security guards and port workers to assist with—or ignore—tampering with containers at the ports. National Police Gen. Pablo Ramírez, Ecuador’s national director of anti-drug investigations, attributed the change to increased smuggling, not better enforcement.
The operator of the largest port in Guayaquil, Contecon Guayaquil S.A., turned down Associated Press requests for an interview and access to the port to see existing security procedures. In response to written questions about the measures, spokeswoman Alexandra Pacheco said in a statement that the operator entered into an agreement with the National Police in 2022 to among other things “reinforce operations in the port.
United Kingdom Latest News, United Kingdom Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Army briefs college students on national securityILOILO CITY – The Army 3rd Infantry Division (ID) briefed students of Central Philippine University (CPU) in this city on the importance of national security.
Read more »
Pendant saves security guard from knife attackLUCENA CITY, Quezon – A pendant saved the life of a security guard from a knife attack by an intoxicated laborer in Purok 7 Bulihan, Barangay Dalahican, here, on Saturday afternoon, September 9.
Read more »
‘PH should ban TikTok for national security execs’The government should “seriously consider” banning the use of the Chinese social media app TikTok for security officials, Jonathan Malaya,
Read more »
PRO 11 to extend security assistance to DTI, DA in implementing EO 39The Police Regional Office 11 (PRO 11) vowed to extend security assistance to the Department of Trade and Industry 11 (DTI 11) and the Department of Agriculture 11 (DA 11) as they conduct monitoring in the implementation of Executive Order (EO) No. 39 or the “Imposition of Mandated Price Ceilings on
Read more »
Artists fear lack of job security, regulations as AI-made song covers go viral in TikTokFrom Frank Sinatra's AI rendition of Dua Lipa's 'Levitating' to Jessica Soho's 'Supershy' song 'cover,' artists say that people are having fun with the tech, but point out some of the dangers too
Read more »
NSC ponders TikTok ban for uniformed personnelThe National Security Council (NSC) is studying the possibility of banning social media platform TikTok among the government’s uniformed personnel to avoid a possible 'data leak.' “What I can do is to raise this with the National Security Adviser [Eduardo Año] if it would be proper for us to do s
Read more »