*Dont bring mangoes or skin-lightening creams into South Africa’: BMA outlines strict rules at borders
AS thousands of travellers queue at various ports of entry into South Africa at the end of the peak holiday travel period, the Border Management Authority (BMA) has warned against bringing agricultural products such as fruit into the country.
BMA Commissioner Dr Mike Masiapato said items including mangoes and watermelons are regularly being seized at border posts and destroyed to prevent the introduction of plant diseases and pests that could threaten South Africa’s agricultural sector.
“In terms of the interceptions that we do involving agricultural products, we do not necessarily effect arrests. What we do instead is confiscate those items and destroy them through incinerators,” Masiapato told SABC News at the Beitbridge border post.
“You are not allowed to bring, for example, mangoes from outside South Africa into the country. You are not allowed to bring certain kinds of watermelon. You are not allowed to bring anything – mangoes, apples, whatever the case is,” he said.
