The humble mango, a Dominican fruit par excellence, has made it into the United States market at last. The Listin Diario revealed that the United States inspectors had approved the newly built facility in the city of Moca, Espaillat province, and that the first shipment of 546 boxes of mangos were sent out last week. This initial shipment was followed by a further shipment of 468 boxes. The Antonio R. Taveras Agroindustrial Company announced that USDA-APHIS department inspectors had approved the processes that will from now on allow Dominican mangos to enter the United States without any difficulties. The new enterprise should produce an additional US$5 million to US$6 million in new income for the sector. The company currently employs 80 people and is expected to increase its labor force to 160 as exports increase. Mango producers from Bani and the south will have to transport their produce to Moca for export, however. Agriculture Minister Amilcar Romero told the Listin Diarion that this initiative represented a boost for mango farms in the Cibao Valley as well as in other regions. The installation of the new facility reinforces Hispaniola’s positioning as a leading mango exporter given that Haiti has been exporting mangos to the United States for nearly 20 years.
Banks press to enter remittance market
The flow of US$2.7 billion has attracted commercial banks to the remittance business and placed them in direct competition with the small Dominican businesses that had operated with near exclusivity for years. The market is still dominated by the companies that started sending remittances back home twenty years ago from the New York Metropolitan Area. These companies offer a personalized, door-to-door service. Because of this service the larger commercial banks, favored by recent restrictions implemented by the Treasury Department, have had a hard time getting a foothold in the market. Clients who do not want to have to travel to a bank from their homes in the countryside, or wait in line at the bank, much prefer the “Dominicanized” system to the more formal work of the commercial banks. According to a study carried out by the Economics Department at Columbia University, there is no other country in Latin America – or in the world for that matter – that offers the door-to-door service as effectively as in the Dominican Republic.