These losses would devastate Florida agriculture and adversely impact the nation. Much

of the lost production would move to Mexico. Production of tomatoes would increase more than

80 percent in Mexico. Mexico would also increase production of bell peppers (54 percent),

cucumbers (7 percent) and eggplant (123 percent). Mexico would become the major supplier

of these vegetables in the winter market, and the sole supplier of eggplant. Texas would benefit

from a methyl bromide ban on bell peppers (increasing 143 percent) as they currently do not use

it in their production systems.


Conclusions

 While Mexico does not currently use methyl bromide on all of their vegetables, there has

been a trend of increasing use of methyl bromide in producing vegetables in Mexico. Because

the Montreal Protocol allows developing countries such as Mexico to use methyl bromide for

10 additional years beyond the 2001 cutoff date for developed countries, Mexico will be the

primary beneficiary of this ban for these crops in the winter market, and they will likely use

methyl bromide to produce this increased production. The result could be only a small reduction

in the overall use of methyl bromide, but a large shift in production away from Florida to

Mexico.

 Not considering the impact this may have on food security for the U.S., a ban on methyl

bromide would have a devastating impact on Florida, given current technology. The schedule

for eliminating the use of methyl bromide currently freezes consumptive levels at 1991 baseline

levels in 1994, and total phaseout by January 1, 2001. This gives Florida growers little time

to develop a suitable substitute. The alternatives outlined in this project do not effectively

substitute for methyl bromide. At present, research has not identified a likely candidate for substitution.