Chilean president Michelle Bachelet has visited a new phytosanitary inspection plant for fruit exports in the city of Cabrero to mark its official opening.
Cabrero’s mayor, Mario Gierke, said the opening marked the first milestone in the journey to make the city the “logistics capital of southern Chile”.
The 20,000m2 facility, which is jointly managed by SAG, the US Department of Agriculture and Asoex, is the largest and most modern plant in South America.
In the two months since it opened it has already processed 1.5m cartons of fruit which were shipped to the US.
Once it is fully functional it will employ more than 150 workers and have the potential to process 10m cartons of fruits, vegetables and flowers a year.
This is the seventh such plant in Chile and its construction was financed by the regional government as part of a wider project to convert Cabrero into a logistics hub serving central southern production zones.
Its strategic location in the geographical centre of Chile in the Bio-bio Region will allow exporters to avoid lengthy transfers to inspection centres located to the north of the country and ship their products directly from ports within the region.
