São Paulo's wholesale produce markete--Ceagesp (Companhia de Entrepostos e Armazéns Gerais de São Paulo)--lost 7,000 tons of food with the São Paulo rains on Monday (10).
This volume accounts for about 70% of the daily movement of the center (which is between 10,000 and 11,000 tons) and represents R$ 20 million (US$ 4,6 million) in losses to permit holders - the merchants who work on the site. The company also lost between R$3 million and R$4 million on Tuesday because it remained closed.
The president of Ceagesp, Johnni Hunter Nogueira, assesses that this Tuesday's losses may be recoverable. "That is why we will make a task force so that, once it is completely clean, the market will operate 24 hours to dilute these losses," he said.
All food that came into contact with water in the floods will be taken to a landfill and destroyed.
The most affected products were fruits and vegetables. Fish and floriculture products had no losses. The company also canceled the flower and fish fairs that would have started at dawn on Tuesday (11) because of the flooding.
There is no risk of food shortages because part of the goods that were to be delivered was saved before the flood hit Ceagesp.
Translated by Kiratiana Freelon