The local citrus industry is not being threatened by a new greening disease, Justin Chadwick, CEO of the Citrus Growers' Association of Southern Africa (CGA), said in statement yesterday.
“African Citrus Greening (ACG) is under official control in South Africa by preventing movement of propagation material from greening areas to greening-free areas. It is important to note that ACG cannot be spread by fruit or seed, and resultantly there is no restriction on the movement of citrus fruit - and this applies worldwide. Therefore, any suggestions that export citrus can spread this disease is incorrect,” he added.
The statement came after CGA said some media outlets were incorrectly reporting that South Africa faced a new disease threat in the form of the African strain of the citrus-greening disease.
HLB (Huanglongbing or Asian Citrus Greening, and sometimes casually referred to as Yellow Dragon) is a feared citrus disease and has caused devastation in some citrus producing regions throughout the world. This disease is not present in South Africa.
ACG was detected in October 2023 near Gqeberha, in an area where it has not been detected before but simply required further control measures to continue the successful prevention of the spread to commercial citrus production areas,
“To link ACG in any way with current cases at the World Trade Organisation on unnecessary and trade restrictive Citrus Black Spot (CBS) and False Codling Moth (FCM) measures, is inappropriate. The CBS and FCM cases filed against the European Union is in no way related to ACG,” Chadwick added.
African Greening was not a threat to the future of the South African citrus industry, he reiterated, adding that the industry was well on course to continue its impressive growth trajectory in the next few years.
“This is a testament to the hard work of the growers, the quality of our fruit and the robust phytosanitary measures implemented by the South African government and the industry itself,” he said.
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