With the price of avocados too high for everyday Mexicans, the country’s officals are considering importing the fruit. Avocados are native to Mexico, which supplies roughly half the world’s demand, but a pound of the fruit now sells for 80 pesos — the same as Mexico’s minimum wage.
“It seems laughable, being able to bring in avocados from other areas at a time when we are so successful in exporting [avocados] … but we’re not ruling it out,” said economy secretary Ildefonso Guajardo.
Avocados now generate more money for Mexico that petroleum, as they gain popularity around the world. Consumption in the U.S. has been climbing at a rate of 15 percent per year. “One town – Tancítaro in Michoacán state – ships out more than a million dollars’ worth of avocado every day, and growers there even organized an armed vigilante group to fight off extortion and threats from criminal cartels,” says The Guardian.