Costa Rica banana exports increased by 24 per cent in value and 17 per cent in volume in the first half of the year compared to the same period in 2015 according to national banana corporation Corbana.
General manager Jorge Sauma said the rise was due to better weather condition. “Last year was very difficult for producers as they were seriously affected by flooding on farms,” he told La Nación,
Sauma noted that although the increase in part reflected the recovery in production, a comparison with figures for the first half of 2014, a “normal” year, showed that the results were positive.
Shipments reached 61.2m boxes between January and June, compared with 51.1m boxes in the corresponding period of 2015 and 57.1m boxes in 2014.
Bananas are Costa Rica’s biggest export, ahead of pineapples, medical devices and medical prosthesis, according to the statistics of 2015 exports by foreign trade agency Procomer.
Its main market is the US, absorbing 38 per cent of the total export volume, followed by Italy (11 per cent), the UK (8 per cent), Belgium (7 per cent), Germany (7 per cent) and the Netherlands (4 per cent).
