Episode 80 - Avocados

The Basics

What are avocados?

Avocados are a fruit: specifically, a berry. But like olives, they aren’t sweet. We primarily eat avocados, but avocados can also be used to make oil and cosmetics.

Avocados grow on avocado trees, which are tropical evergreen trees that grow throughout the year. They originated in Guatemala, Mexico, and the West Indies.

In the early 1900s, avocados were known as alligator pears because of their bumpy skins. Avocado is the traditional name—it comes from the Aztec “ahuacacuahatl” or “testicle tree”. But we call them avocados today because the California industry association decided that this more exotic name would sell better.

The Rise of the Avocado

Avocados were sold as a luxury item for most of the 20th century after a marketing effort in the 1920s. In the 1980s, avocados took a hit as low-fat diets became popular.

The mainstream popularity of avocados was a result of a marketing campaign in the 1990s paid for by California avocado growers. The campaign pitched guacamole as a Superbowl snack by soliciting guacamole recipes from NFL players in what they called the “Guacamole Bowl”. Apparently, it’s still a big Superbowl snack in the U.S.: 162 million pounds of avocado was consumed during the 2019 Superbowl. The Superbowl is when 7% of annual avocado consumption happens.

Then where was this truly bizarre campaign called “Searching for Mrs. Ripe”, where a panel of celebrity judges chose a partner for an avocado known as “Mr. Ripe Guy”.

The avocado market really grew in the 2010s, when the fruit became known as a superfood and avocado toast gained popularity. Avocado toast is believed to have first appeared on a menu in Sydney, Australia in 1993 (but this is contested). In 2013, Gwenyth Paltrow put it in her cookbook. The avocado market in Canada increased by 240% between 2010 and 2019.[1]

Where are avocados grown

Avocados grow best in humid, tropical weather with well-draining soil. They are mostly grown in Central America, but now they grow in different regions around the world.

Mexico produces about 80% of the U.S. avocado supply and 95% of avocados in  Canada.[2] Overall, Mexico produces more than 1/3 of the world’s avocados.[3] Most of these (92%) come from Michoacán,[4] which is a state on Mexico’s southwest coast near Jalisco. After Mexico, the next largest producers are: Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Peru, Indonesia, Kenya, and Brazil. Avocado production is growing especially in African countries.

There are some avocados grown in the U.S., mostly in California. California historically was a bigger producer because there was a US ban on Mexican avocados from 1914-1997 (pest related) that was lifted when NAFTA was passed. Today, the only Mexican state approved to send avocados to the U.S. is Michoacán.

Let’s talk about Hass avocados

There are a lot of different varieties of avocado. In Florida alone, there are 56 varieties of avocado.

But most of the avocados sold today—97% of avocados sold in the U.S.—are Hass avocados. Hass avocados are small and have a pebbly skin. Their tough skin makes them easy to transport. Haas avocadoes were discovered in the 1920s. All Haas avocadoes are descendent from a “mother Hass tree” in La Habra Heights, California.

Growing avocados

Avocados grow on trees. They are picked when their fat content is high enough and then they continue to ripen off the tree.

There are different seasons for different avocado varieties, and harvest frequency seems to depend on conditions. Most American avocado orchards are harvested 2-3 times per year. But at high altitudes in Mexico, avocados grow year-round and are harvested four times per year.

Avocados are difficult to pollinate. So, most avocado growers graft onto producing trees. This means joining the branch of one tree to the roots of another so they grow together. A new avocado tree from a seed takes 4-6 years to produce fruit. Avocados susceptible to viral, bacterial, and nutritional diseases—they’re monocultures, which isn’t great for biodiversity and can create food insecurity risks.

Avocado supply chain

Most avocado growers in Mexico have 5-10 hectares of land, but avocado farms can be much larger. In California, some avocado farms are over 100 hectares. 

Avocados are picked by hand, with farm workers cutting the avocado off of the tree from its stem. For avocados that are higher up, there are picking poles and ladders. This means that avocado picking is labour intensive.

After avocados are harvested, they are transported in bins to the packing plant, where they get cleaned, sorted, packed, and then placed into cold storage before transport. In Mexico, most avocados are packed in Uruapan. 

Environment

Greenhouse Gas Emissions

According to one calculation, the emissions footprint of an avocado has an emissions footprint of 423g CO2 (based on halving 846.36g CO2 for a two-pack), which is more than for a large cappuccino with dairy milk (235g CO2).

But for context: a kilogram of beef takes 60,000g CO2 to produce and poultry takes 6,000g CO2. So, a kilogram of beef is about 142x as emissions intensive as an avocado to grow. Even if you take it on a per calorie basis, beef is still more than 20x as emissions intensive. (Chicken is only about 2x as emissions intensive on a per calorie basis).

For most food products, the largest sources of emissions are land use change and farm-stage emissions. The environmental impact of processing, transport, retail, and packaging is typically pretty low. 

Water use

Avocados are a water-intensive crop. It takes approximately 70 litres of water to grow an avocado, which is already a lot. For context, this is twelve times more water than it takes to grow a tomato. But in some regions that are very dry, an avocado can take as much as 320 litres to grow.

Approximately 9.5 billion litres of water are used daily to produce avocado (3,800 Olympic sized swimming pools full). One hectare of avocado with 156 avocado trees consumes 1.6x more water than a forest with 677 trees per hectare.

Even more concerning is the fact that avocados are grown in relatively arid regions like California and Mexico that suffer from high water stress. Avocado production from Michoacán requires extraction of water from aquifers, which is causing small earthquakes because it has opened up small subsoil caverns. In Chile, there is evidence of avocado plantation owners depriving local villages of groundwater

Deforestation

Avocado production has driven 30-40% of recent deforestation in Michoacán. Deforestation leads to erosion and river overflow, which can cause dangerous flooding. Land clearing for avocado production has contributed to the destruction of butterfly habitat. Monarch butterflies come to Mexico in the winter. 

People

Working conditions

The working conditions of avocado farm workers seemed broadly in line with other forms of agriculture – which is to say not great and fairly low wages. Most harvesters in Mexico today work for hourly wages of about $6 USD with no benefits. In the U.S., it looks like avocado harvesters are paid piece rates—paid by item, rather than hourly. The typical price is $1.05-1.35/pound of avocados harvested.

There have been allegations of assault and rape at an avocado plantation in central Kenya called Kazuki PLC, which is a subsidiary of the British-owned agriculture company Camellia PLC.

Mexican packing house workers work 12-hour days for $130 USD per week.

“Blood avocados”/ “Green gold”

Mexican avocados are grown primarily in the state of Michoacán, which is also the frontlines of the drug war. Cartels have gotten involved in the avocado (and other cash crop) industries in Michoacán.

This issue is in many ways similar to blood diamonds or conflict minerals. Like conflict minerals, the avocado industry is providing a vital funding source for cartels, which can then be used to escalate violence and further organized crime.

Mexico has been an important site for drug production and trafficking to service U.S. and Canadian illegal drug markets for a while now. To explain how cartels got into avocados, you have to go back to 2006 when Mexican President Felipe Calderón launched Operation Michoacán, which was a militarized campaign to take back control of the state. It ended up breaking the cartels into dozens of smaller, more difficult to control cartels. When Calderon’s crackdown on drugs started, cartels decided to diversify beyond drugs. Agriculture dominates the Michoacán economy and avocados are a big cash crop. So, the cartels decided to get a piece of the avocado industry. 

What did that mean in practice?

Cartels started to provide security for avocado farmers in exchange for a trading fee (kind of like a tax). This is complicated. In some cases, farmers initially welcomed the drug cartels because they were providing a service the state didn’t provide. Over time, cartels became more predatory and stopped providing services, instead just extorting farmers, transporters, and packers. From 2009-2013, cartels earned $750 million USD from avocados in the Michoacán.[5]

And it’s not just extortion…

Cartels also in some cases directly take over lands used to produce avocados so they become the informal owners and can profit. Theft is also a big issue: four avocado trucks stolen in Michoacán every day.[6] And there are allegations of kidnapping, robbing, harassment, threatening, murder against avocado farmers.[7]

For example: in August 2019,19 people were killed in Uruapan, the second largest city in Michoacán. Attack was claimed by the Jalisco New Generation Cartel and is believed to be related to a fight for control of the drug and avocado industries in the region.

Last month, the U.S. briefly suspended avocado imports from Mexico after an American safety inspector working in the Mexican state of Michoacán was verbally threatened.

Some farmers have abandoned their fields to avoid dealing with the cartels.

Some Michoacán cities, fed up with the extortion and violence, formed self-defence forces/community police. But these became corrupt and cartel members joined. The result is effectively an ongoing war between different cartels and between the cartels and the self-defence forces. As cartels fight to control Michoacán, avocados are a big part of the strategy. The money from avocados provides resources to buy guns etc.

Not all Mexican avocados have a link to cartels, and it can be difficult to tell which is which.

By the way, Michoacán is also a major berry producer and lime producer, so some of these same problems apply there. And actually, there are allegations that cartels have been price-fixing limes by limiting picking to just a few days a week to create a shortage. (Similar to practices in the maple syrup industry)

What You Can Do

What to do about “blood avocados” 

Unlike conflict minerals, there really aren’t clear alternatives available. There are no conflict-free avocado labels. And as with conflict minerals, we should avoid hurting the avocado farmers who are the ones most harmed by the cartels.

I don’t think it’s particularly productive to boycott avocados. Cartels will just move on to the next cash crop.

Other actions to address cartels

If you are American, ask the U.S. to pass stricter gun control laws. The U.S. is the main source of guns for cartels. A 2013 University of San Diego study found that “nearly half of all gun stores in the United States would go out of business were it not for the sales boost provided by the carnage in Mexico”. 

Other actions

Don’t waste avocados. Food waste in general is bad, but especially avocados because they have a relatively high emissions footprint.

Keep avocados fresher longer: make sure any parts without the skin are covered, store them in the fridge when they reach the ripeness you want, and you can freeze them if you don’t think you’ll eat them in time.

You can also buy Fairtrade avocados. This is for smallholder avocado farmers, mostly from Mexico. Fairtrade ensures a price minimum for farmers and pays them a fairtrade premium. One example is avocados from a worker co-op called PRAGOR, which produces organic fairtrade avocados .

You can also buy organic avocados, but this will only deal with use of pesticides and herbicides.

References

[1] Unsavory. (21 February 2021). “Superfoods” and the Avocado Cartels. Unsavory Podcast.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Ibid.

[7] Ibid.