Carriers are driving the rates' race to the bottom' they warned would lead to a "dire situation" in 2024 – Maersk singled out as one of the worst offenders. Announcing the Group's third-quarter flop last week, the Danish carrier's CEO, Vincent Clerc, told investors that the coming year would prove difficult for ocean shipping without an uptick on the spot market in the final three months.

The insecurity and lack of guarantees to continue with banana exports, Ecuador's main non-oil exports, has led the Banana Cluster to undertake a campaign to defend the interests of the production chain. José Antonio Hidalgo, the inter-union coordinator of the Plantain and Banana Cluster of Ecuador, said at a press conference that, in the last six months, they have identified estimated losses of around 280 thousand dollars per quarter, due to robberies in the plantain and banana sector.

According to the company's release, Hapag-Lloyd has concluded the first nine months of 2023 with a Group EBIT of USD 4.5 billion (EUR 4.2 billion) and a Group EBIT of USD 3.0 billion (EUR 2.8 billion). The Group's profit stood at USD 3.4 billion (EUR 3.2 billion). These results are significantly below the prior-year level due to the severe change in market conditions.

Banana growers in the departments of Magdalena and La Guajira have been declared on red alert, as criminal groups have attacked them to pressure extortion payment, according to the country's banana growers' associations. On Tuesday, November 14, armed men broke into two farms, intimidating workers and setting fires, one in the village of Comejenes, Riohacha, and the other in the municipality of Zona Bananera, in Magdalena.

Chiquita announced its exclusive collaboration with Joester Loria Group, a leader in the licensing industry. JLG will serve as Chiquita's official licensing agency, working to expand the brand's reach and create brand extension opportunities. The company said this collaboration signifies a significant step for Chiquita.

"The El Niño phenomenon will make its biggest incursion in mid-December, according to experts from the National Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology (INAMHI)," said Mario Benavides Rojas, zone 7 coordinator of the National Risk Management Service. After learning that after a month of oceanographic and meteorological exploration in the Ecuadorian sea to verify the proximity of the El Niño phenomenon, the scientific research vessel Orion of the Ecuadorian Navy returned from the campaign.

Around 260,000 hectares between Ecuador, Colombia, and Peru will be under active surveillance in a plan against Fusarium Tropical Race 4. In addition, 8,000 producers and agricultural workers will be trained in managing the disease on banana farms, and all members of the cooperation network in Ecuador, Colombia, and Peru will sign an agreement to fight the pest.

Dole has reported higher revenues and adjusted EBITDA for the three months leading up to the end of September. The company said its third-quarter revenues rose 4.2% to $2 billion. In comparison, its adjusted EBITDA increased by 7.6% to $85.2m, and revenue at its Fresh Fruit division decreased by 0.3% due to lower banana prices in North America. This dip was partially offset by higher worldwide volumes of bananas sold, increased worldwide pineapple pricing, and more substantial European banana pricing.

The Intersectoral Roundtable on Banana Competitiveness (Menicob) and the Paraguayan Chamber of Bananas and Pineapples (Capabap) decided to suspend the loading of fruits to Argentina as of November 13. On the one hand, the US$ 10 million debt held by Argentine importers is concentrated in three regions of Paraguay. These are Caaguazú, San Pedro, and Cordillera, and the US$12 million owed to Bolivia is for fruit from the Cochabamba region.

Plátano de Canarias is breaking historical production records throughout 2023 and selling more than the levels before the eruption of the La Palma volcano, which the entire sector welcomes, according to Sergio Cáceres, manager and marketing director of Asprocan.

The European Commission has published a delegated regulation and an implementing regulation supplementing the marketing standards for the horticultural sector and also adapting rules for the "Farm to Fork" strategy. On November 4, the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) published these two regulations with measures that, in practice, further elaborate on the 2013 regulation that created the common organization of the markets in agricultural products.

The Main Banana Ports of Ecuador

On November 6, Ecuador raised the minimum price per box that exporters pay producers from USD 6.50 to USD 6.85, only for the fruit. The new price will be applied starting January 1, 2024, as announced by the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), NOAA's National Weather Service of the USA, above-average sea surface temperatures (SST) across the equatorial Pacific Ocean were indicative of a strong El Niño, with anomalies increasing in the central and east-central Pacific in the past month. The latest weekly Niño index values were +1.4ºC in Niño-4, +1.8ºC in Niño-3.4, +2.1ºC in Niño-3, and +2.2ºC in Niño-1+2.

Banana workers from more than 21 farms in the province of Bocas del Toro decided in a General Assembly to join the strike against the concession granted to Minera Panama. This decision has the country convulsed. The strike approved by the Union of Workers of the Banana Industry, Agriculture and Related Companies (Sitraibana) is for 48 hours, extendable, throughout the banana division of the province of Bocas del Toro.