Israel’s largest grower and exporter of citrus — Mehadrin — announced this week that it will begin growing avocados in Morocco for the first time, as it attempts to meet constantly rising demand for the superfood, according to The Algemeiner.
Following the signing of the Abraham Accords in 2020 — to which the North African kingdom was the last of the four Muslim majority and Arab countries to join — there has been a gradual deepening of ties between the Jewish state and Morocco.
Mehadrin is looking to expand production to Africa and Latin America in a bid to produce the fruit year-round and also lower costs.
“Planting the avocados in Morocco is part of a larger plan to be able to supply our European customers more easily than from Israel in terms of geography and in terms of more competitive costs,” Mehadrin CEO Shaul Shelach told The Algemeiner.
Shelach added that demand for avocados is currently outstripping supply, which he assesses will be a thing of the past when the superfood is grown more widely in both hemispheres of the globe. The current Israeli growing season is from October to March or April.
The Mehadrin CEO expects to receive the land from the Moroccan government shortly, and there are plans to start planting in March. Produce will first be available in two or three years and a full harvest can be expected in about five years' time.
Foreign Minister and Alternate Prime Minister Yair Lapid recently visited Rabat and announced that the two countries will open full diplomatic relations — with respective embassies — in approximately two months' time.