The Mexican mango program of Continental Fresh LLC is seasonally gearing up this March, according to Albert Perez, CEO and head of grower relations.

Continental, a Miami-based importer of Latin American fruits, ships mangos from the whole gamut of Mexico’s growing areas, ranging from Oaxaca early in the season, to finishing in Los Mochis, Sinaloa, as late as September. The firm has packinghouses in Oaxaca, Michoacan, Nayarit, southern Sinaloa and in Los Mochis, which is in the northern part of the state.

Top level food safety, social responsibility and foreign supplier certifications are in place for all Continental associates.

Almost all of Continental’s mangos enter the United States through south Texas ports. The firm works in a third-party warehouse in the McAllen area.

“This is our second year of importing our own program of Mexican mangos,” Perez said. Last year, Continental handled 2.1 million boxes of mangos, which ranked 11th in volume for U.S. importers of Mexican mangos.

This year, Perez expects to import three million boxes.

Continental packs in traditional four-kilo boxes, as well as the 5-pound box now being promoted by the National Mango Promotion Board.

Continental offers all major commercial mango varieties, including Tommy Atkins, Hayden, Kent, Keitt and some Ataulfos.

Beyond Mexico, Continental supplies mangos year-round from Brazil, Ecuador, Peru and Guatemala. Wide supply sources enable the firm to provide a variety of customers with reliable contract programs.

Perez first worked in the Caribbean and Central American produce business in the 1980s. He worked for leading importers from the region, then launched Continental fourteen years ago.

Continental is also among the United States’ largest importer of Honduran cucumbers and squash. Continental Honduran vegetable program, which comes out of Comayagua, runs from January into April.

Continental is increasing the size of its import program for Mexican vegetables. “It’s something we are going to be developing in the next few years,” said Perez. This season, for the first time, Perez is importing Mexican green Bell peppers. The Mexican vegetables are coming from Culiacan and the Guasave area.

Water for All – Food for Humanity
During his 36 years of working in Latin America, Perez developed a concern about Latin Americans’ lack of clean water. He has particularly focused on helping provide people in the Dominican Republic with fresh water supplies.

He started an annual summertime project, leading groups of a couple dozen high school students to work on building Dominican water facilities. One of these students, Danny Rodriguez, who is now 30, was so enthralled with the work that he started the Blue Missions organization, which grew to be a fulltime, year-round vocation. Blue Missions leads 600 students per summer to the DR. The country is so needy, that there is a never-ending list of homes in need of water, Perez said. 

Continental’s bright blue mango label is Water for All. Each Water for All mango has a water drop symbol on its PLU sticker.

Perez donates one cent for the sale of each Water for All carton. He also donates a penny for every vegetable box he sells. That label is Food for Humanity.

The money goes to the Blue Missions organization. So far, Perez has contributed $26,000 to Blue Missions. 

According to Blue Missions’ website, “We are dedicated to improving public health by providing families with clean water and sanitary environments. Through sustainable, community-owned projects, our team works with locals to empower progress and transform rural communities for the better.”

COVID-19 impact
Perez said the coronavirus epidemic has not been too harmful to Continental because his primary commodity, mango, is “a very retail-oriented item and retail sales have been good.”

Demand for vegetables, however, is erratic. “Those vegetables rely so much on the foodservice industry,” he noted. “Our fruit sales have been up. Our vegetables have been down. I will say that 2020 in general was one of the strongest we’ve had in our 14-year history. We’ve had the highest sales we’ve ever experienced.”