“Health opens markets: a contingency closes them over hours,” said Jorge Esteve, president of the National Agricultural Council, during the Global Agrifood Forum, which is held in the capital of Chihuahua.
The agricultural leader pointed out his concern about budget cuts in the field. And he recalled that Senasica’s budget was reduced at least 20% in the last 10 years, at the same time that production has doubled in that process. Therefore, there are currently half of the resources for the amount of hectares in which it is sown and produced in Mexico.
Health and safety are a nation heritage that we must all defend and demand that the resources required be put
Jorge Esteve, president of the National Agricultural Council.
Esteve added that “the borers is the perfect example, we were slow to see him come from Central America and we are barely starting a sterile fly plant in Chiapas that still is missing six months to be ready.”
The budget for Senasica contracts for 2026
The agricultural market consulting group expressed concern about the reduction in the assigned budget, in the Economic Package 2026 to the National Service of Health, Safety and Agrifood Quality (Senasica). This institution is in charge, among other things, of attending health crises such as those of the boreride worm.
Although a marginal increase in its 0.9% resources is proposed for Sader, those destined for Senasica fell 6.4% for next year, “opening questions about food biosafety,” according to the consulting group.
“The budget stability in Sader contrasts with the general increase of PPEC, which could limit attention to structural challenges (productivity, health and safety). The cut of -6.4% in health and safety generates risk for agri -food competitiveness and health security,” says the analysis.
“It wasn’t our responsibility”: Berdegué
In response, the Secretary of Agriculture and Rural Development (Sader), Julio Berdegué, assured that the campaign to contain this plague – with the position of Senasica and in conjunction with specialized units of the US government and the livestock associations of the whole country – is being successful.
And he argued, during the inauguration of the FGA, that the borers advanced in a year and a half almost 3,000 kilometers from Panama to the borders of Mexico, so not “It was not our responsibility to contain this plague, he advanced without brake, it was from others, and advanced without brake.”
In addition, he pointed out that in Mexico he advanced in the last 10 months and has been contained in the southern states, without registration of contagion in the states of the center and the north. He stressed that in that period 0.005% of the national livestock herd has been infected and that in the last week, throughout the Republic, only 371 new cases have been recorded, which is equivalent to less than one thousandth.
These data, Berdegué said, allow to affirm that Mexican livestock is a safe livestock (…) especially of export states. There is no technical or scientific reason that justifies the closure of the border to Mexican exports.
He informed that there is currently a new review at the export points that, he expects, will contribute new evidence that each head of cattle that crosses from Chihuahua to Texas is safe. “It’s time for cattle trade to be normal,” he emphasized. And, on the budget raised in the 2026 economic package, Berdegué just said that his secretariat has the appropriate resources.
Mexico is a global co -responsible
Regarding the statement of the head of Sader that it was not the responsibility of the Government to stop the spread of the Barrenador worm plague from Central America, Fernando Cruz, director of GCMA, said:
“It is Mexico’s responsibility (constitutional) to maintain the healing and safety of the livestock sector in Mexico (…). Sader is the authority responsible for guaranteeing the health and safety of foods that occur and consume in the national territory.”
In addition, he pointed out that Mexico has signed international conventions about pest fight that affects the sector, which is why it is obliged as a world co -responsible. And that the country, being a cattle exporter for the United States, and considering that thousands of families depend on the export of animals, is responsible for generating a solution and fighting in national territory to the plague to guarantee access to the North American market.
