Apple banana ≠ banana ≠ green pass products? Official response

The Paper's reporter Zhu Xuan

Apple banana, plantain, is it a banana?

Recently, when a cargo owner in Kunming, Yunnan Province, said that when he pulled a cart of 9 tons of apple bananas to pass by the Daying High-speed Toll Station, the toll station personnel insisted that the bananas were not bananas, could not be counted as green passes (products), could not take the green channel, and needed to charge 1066 yuan.

On July 9, a staff member of the Transportation Service Supervision Hotline of the Yunnan Provincial Department of Transportation said that bananas are green tong products, but apple bananas and plantains are not green tong products. This standard comes from the relevant policies formulated by the state on the green channel for the transportation of fresh agricultural products.

On the same day, a staff member of the Kunming Municipal Transportation Bureau responded to the surging news that when the car passed through the toll station, the staff believed that the car did not belong to the green pass products.

The staff member said that products within the scope of the Green Pass stipulated by the Ministry of Transport can only take the green channel, and if they are not in it (they cannot go), the toll booth does not have the power to decide whether a thing is a green pass product or not. Taking meat as an example, there are live poultry such as pork, beef and chicken, as well as manufactured products, but not all of them are green tong products.

According to the news released on the official website of the Ministry of Transport, in December 2009, the Ministry of Transport and the National Development and Reform Commission jointly issued the Notice on Further Improving and Implementing the Green Channel Policy for the Transportation of Fresh Agricultural Products, which clearly exempts vehicle tolls for vehicles legally loaded with fresh agricultural products nationwide.

The "Notice" clearly defines the vehicles that enjoy the "green channel" policy for the transportation of fresh agricultural products, mainly in three aspects. First, the loaded fresh agricultural products belong to the scope of free varieties. The second is to meet the requirements of the whole vehicle loading. The third is to meet the requirements of legal loading and transportation.

Among them, fresh agricultural products must be within the scope of free varieties, and the Notice clearly lists the Catalogue of Varieties of Fresh Agricultural Products that can enjoy the free policy, including 128 specific varieties or categories in the major categories such as fresh vegetables, fresh fruits, fresh aquatic products and fresh meat, eggs and milk.

The Paper noted that in the Catalogue of Varieties of Fresh Agricultural Products, bananas are in the "Common Varieties Examples" column of fresh fruits. Plantains and apple bananas are not listed.

Notice on further improving and implementing the green channel policy for the transportation of fresh agricultural products. Image source: The official website of the Ministry of Transport

So, is the apple banana a banana or not? One of the producing areas of apple bananas, the yangxi county government website in Guangdong Province, has published an article introducing that the banana varieties grown locally include three major varieties of Brazilian bananas, apple bananas and powder bananas.

On some Q&A community websites, is the Catalogue of Varieties of Fresh Agricultural Products an example or the only catalogue? It also triggered discussions among netizens. Many netizens believe that because the implementation of the policy is too rigid, it has led to the emergence of "vegetables are not vegetables, fruits are not fruits" in the "green pass". Some netizens suggested that the Catalogue of Varieties of Fresh Agricultural Products should be updated in a timely manner, or stipulate that only some common varieties are examples, including but not limited to these varieties, so that more fruit and vegetable transportation can enjoy such policies to benefit the people.

Source: The Paper