research question

Which are the most controversial aspects among the many avocado trade related concerns?

screen margin1300 alignment1140 USA Mexico CRIME ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES Import-export flows “Los aguacateros del paìs no caben de contentos porque la popularidad del guacamole en Estados Unidos les permitiò exportar 13% mas que el año pasado” PRODUCTION GROWTH TRADE * The “Other” category includes websites related to: avocado varieties, healthy benefits of avocados, recipes, general information about avocado. The choice to aggregate them is due to their low number “Blood avocados no more: Mexican farm town says it's kicked out cartels” Murders “Asesinan a 3 productores de aguacate in Thefts “Los robos a gran escala se han hecho cada vez más frecuentes y dejan grandes pérdidas a los productores” Deforestation “The unprecedented international appetite for this fruit is fuelling illegal deforestation and environmental degradation” Other* Growth of the indu- “La demanda en USA está creciendo el 20% cada año” High prices “In recent years the price of avocados has shifted tremendously” Fair trade co-op “A new perspective of the efforts required to actually set up a weekly small farmer, organic, Fair Trade avocado NAFTA trade agreement “Mexican avocado exports to the U.S. will continue with or without NAFTA” Criminal cartels USA first 50 results for query avocado + trade Mexico first 50 results for query aguacate + trafico Sub-category Extract Category
Description Protocol Data

Description

The visualization is designed to show in detail the most controversial aspects related to avocado trade, analyzing a more specific query compared to the first one. From the first Google search, some problems emerged, even though not on the surface. Consequentially, with this second investigation, we tried to identify this concerns better, still not forcing the results into having more specific useful content. We searched for aguacate+traffic and avocado+trade on Google with the main intent of comparing them. Thanks to this query, we were able to find more controversial elements related to the avocado trade. Twenty-eight results on criminal events are present, including organized crime, murders and thefts derived from the high value of this product. Environmental issues are present in the results; in particular, an interesting reference was found in fair trade cooperative websites, companies that mainly promote a more sustainable farming and equal conditions for producers. Being able to find them in the USA query results is interesting; the reason might be that in the States it is already possible to find some kind of awareness towards intensive farming.

On the left side, the graph shows Mexico and USA as cores from which links are connected to their queries; they are connected to a sub-categorization that belongs to the categories previously identified for visualization 1. To make these categories more solid, we paired them with some extracts from the articles we considered for visualization 2.

Protocol

example of protocol

For this protocol we started from a more specific query, the aim being to let the issues emerge; we preferred not to use targeted words, to not influence the results. For this reason, we searched for “aguacate+trafico” and “avocado trade” in Google Mexico and USA. We used Instant Data Scraper to fasten the process and harvest the data; they have been listed in the ranking with their links. For both queries, the first 50 results have been sorted in the categories we identified in protocol 1; though we did a further categorization to better highlight the content, they talked about. The “Other” category includes websites related to avocado varieties, healthy benefits of avocado, recipes, general information about avocados. The choice to aggregate them is due to their low number in results.

Data

Data Source:
Google advanced Instant Data Scraper
Timestamp: 19/10/2018
View Dataset

Using Instant Data Scraper, we collected the information necessary by listing the first 50 Google results both for Mexico and USA. This dataset is set up by rank, title and link of each website, finally categorizing their content.