BEIRUT, Aug. 16 (Xinhua) -- The smuggling of agro-products to Lebanon is hurting the country's agriculture sector, said a representative of the sector in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley on Thursday.
"We have been coordinating with the customs authorities since three months ago to control the smuggling of agricultural products to Lebanon, but we did not fully succeed because there is no proper accountability by the government in this regard," Ibrahim Tarshishi, head of the Syndicate of Bekaa Farmers, told MTV, a local TV channel.
Tarshishi called upon the customs authorities to be stricter in controlling smuggling activities not only in Bekaa but the rest of the Lebanese areas which would reduce such practices by 90 percent.
Tarshishi announced a day earlier that the Lebanese market receives daily 500 tons of smuggled agricultural products.
The quality of products smuggled to Lebanon is not guaranteed, Tarshishi said.
"We do not know what kind of pesticides or water are being used for these products," he was quoted by the National News Agency as saying.
Tarshishi expressed his worries that the drop in Turkish lira will result in the flow of Turkish agricultural products to Syria and then to Lebanon which will hurt further the local sector.
