The first Mexican outbreak of Huanglongbing (HLB), the bacterial disease known as citrus greening, has been confirmed by the country's plant protection service Sanidad Vegetal.
Six trees on the Yucatan Peninsula were found to be infected with the disease, according to Bob Blakely of California Citrus Mutual in the US, who told The Packer that the United States Department of Agriculture and Mexican officials were continuing to search for Asian citrus psyllids (the carriers of the disease) and treating areas along the US-Mexico border.
'Mexico has been very cooperative in fighting the Asian citrus psyllid and HLB,' said Mr Blakely. 'We have another meeting next month to further develop the strategic plan for our cooperative effort against HLB.'
The major fear for the industry is that the disease is already in California, where it could have arrived in landscaping or nursery stock shipped from Florida, where citrus greening has forced growers to destroy or abandon over 80,000ha of citrus groves.
'If it's sitting in someone's backyard down in LA County, and there is no psyllids to move it around, it just sits there as a repository,' Mr Blakely added. 'All it takes is for once psyllid to feed on that tree, and the disease starts to spread.'
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