Tomato producers in the Canary Islands have slammed the decision by the Spanish government to donate more than €520m to Morocco, claiming that a lack of investment in the region is harming their fresh produce industry.
Spanish national producer-exporter association Fepex criticised the move, announced following a Spanish-Moroccan summit, as having been made in spite of what it claimed were the lack of grants for the Canaries’ transport system over the past two years.
Fedex said the lack of investment in this and other areas of the region’s infrastructure was affecting tomato producers and the 20,000 families in the islands that rely on the industry for their income.
The agreements with Morocco could have “a devastating effect on workers and the horticultural production, such as tomato cultivation”, said Fedex spokesman Roberto Goiriz told Spanish daily ABC.
