Apartado is a Colombian town in the Uraba region of the Antioquia Province, which stands out for a high banana production. Indeed, the banana growing is their main source for making a livelihood. According to the Colombian Association of Banana Producers, in 2017 more than 34,000 hectares were used to this cultivation. The very town of Apartado has 132 banana-growing farms, which clean the fruits in order to ensure a high production and quality. This process consists in removing the latex, dust, insects and those clusters with signs of damage, scratches, or deformed. To do so, great volumes of water are poured into a shallow pit. These waters require a previous treatment in order to remove any contaminant load. To ensure all this, Colombia passed the Resolution 0631/15 that provides the maximum parameters and values allowed for the water discharges. Therefore, this study evaluates the wastewater coming from four banana-growing farms and, in turn, analyzes the waters of the Apartado River in order to determine whether there is any impact by the wastewater discharges from the farms. On the other hand, the discharged wastewater was checked to confirm whether they comply with the regulations. The river was applied the water quality index (ICA, Spanish acronym) and the results indicate a good water quality in the study locations with scores between 44 and 66.
