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Horticulture

As the demand for the South American tropical fruit avocado rises among health-conscious customers, ambitious farmers are embracing its growing in the state

Often referred to as butter fruit, this fruit is a great source of healthful fats, antioxidants that fight disease and aging, and almost 20 different vitamins and minerals. The fruit has a deep flavor and a creamy consistency. To fulfill the increasing demand, it is now mostly imported, but some ambitious people are attempting to cultivate it locally.

The crop will soon be the subject of research at Telangana State Horticultural University’s Sangareddy campus. For 2024–2025, the horticulture department had set a modest goal of 20 hectares to promote the avocado production.

Enthusiastic farmers took up cultivation of the avocado crop even before the horticulture department started its research. One can grow more avocado trees per acre of land than mangoes and the retail price is between Rs 400 to Rs 500 per kg. Containing a lot of minerals, vitamins and is rich with fats which are good for health. As it does not have sugars, it’s good for diabetics also.

It is stated that the avocado oil, which costs Rs 1,500 per litre, has properties similar to those of olive oil and is beneficial for the skin, heart, and Vitamin E. As a result, it is utilized in cooking and cosmetics. According to data just released by the American Heart Association, eating avocados lowers the risk of having a heart attack by 30 per cent. International demand for the fruit has been strong. For the past six years, we have been providing farmers with training programs. We market the fruit, maintain a nursery, and conduct field tests. Around it, we are creating an ecology. The demand for it is enormous on a global scale. Fruit folate promotes the development of the baby’s brain and spine and facilitates digestion during pregnancy.

As the demand for the South American

Company News, Horticulture, India, Supply Chain

Westfalia ripe and ready-to-eat avocados will be available in a special punnet and consumers can be assured of consistent quality and ripeness

Westfalia Fruit India announced the launch of its first Avocado ripening facility in Mumbai, India. This will allow the company to supply avocados that are ready to eat to consumers in Mumbai and neighbouring areas.

The dedicated ripening chamber has been built in Navi Mumbai, near the APMC market and was launched at a ceremony. In addition to the Westfalia Fruit India leadership team, the launch ceremony was attended by leading fruit distributors, wholesalers, offline retailers, and e-commerce operators.

Westfalia Fruit India has established itself as the market leader and largest importer of avocados in India. Westfalia Fruit started its India journey last year and has already supplied over 1,000 MT of avocados to the Indian market in 2023. This year also marks the first year of commercial harvest of Indian-grown Hass avocados. Over the next few years, over 500 acres of our existing Hass avocado plantations in Southern India will come into production, enabling consistent year-round availability of avocados for consumers.

Speaking at the launch, Zac Bard, Director – Westfalia Fruit India, said that “Avocado ripeness has been a challenge for both retailers and consumers in India. Many consumers in India are not sure when is the perfect time to eat an avocado. Retailers also at times are unaware of how to differently handle Hass avocados at different stages of their ripeness. Our perfectly ripened avocados will look to address this gap in the market.”

“Westfalia ripe and ready-to-eat avocados will be available in a special punnet and consumers can be assured of consistent quality and ripeness. This ripening facility will be a milestone in India and will change the way avocados are marketed and consumed”, added Zac.

“Westfalia Fruit India is excellently placed to offer avocados consistently from multiple origins all year round mentioned,” GVK Naidu, Director – Westfalia Fruit India and MD of Sam Agri group, the Indian JV partners of Westfalia. “This ripening facility in Mumbai is just the start and in the coming months, we will have similar facilities in other major metros of the country,” added Naidu.

Westfalia ripe and ready-to-eat avocados will be

Company News, Horticulture, India, Sustainability

West-In Avo is looking to expand the total nursery capacity to propagate over 100,000 plants a year

Alk Brand, Group CEO of Westfalia Fruit, is on his maiden visit to India after the establishment of West-In Avo, a joint venture of Westfalia Fruit International with Sam Agri – India, Dvori or & Zohara Farms – Israel for an integrated avocado growing and marketing project. The visit included a review of West-In Avo’s long-term strategy for the Indian market, growth plans and commitment of Westfalia Fruit to develop the avocado industry in India.

West-In Avo is looking to expand the total nursery capacity to propagate over 100,000 plants a year and start producing clonal plants, which have better tolerance to phytophthora root rot and are ideally suited for the high rainfall tropical growing conditions in the Western Ghats region. West-In Avo is looking to work with large and small growers in this region to expand avocado growing areas from the current plantation of 120 hectares to over 1000 hectares in the next 3-4 years.

“We have had a strong start to our partnership in India, establishing ourselves as the market leader in avocados – having the largest growing footprint of avocado orchards and marketing avocado fruit in the Indian market. We see a great potential for India developing into a large market for growing Hass avocados for both domestic consumption and exports and Westfalia Fruit will take a leadership role in establishing the avocado industry in India,” mentioned Alk Brand, Group CEO of Westfalia Fruit Group.

GVK Naidu, MD of Sam Agri Group added, “Being the first integrated avocado project in India, we have built a solid relationship with our grower partners by providing the highest quality planting material, continued technical support, developing a package of practices for Indian conditions and also offer buy back of produce for marketing.”

West-In Avo is looking to expand the

AgroPolicy, Horticulture, India, Supply Chain, Trade

The announcement was made in a Joint Statement by the Australian Prime Minister and the Prime Minister of India in March 2023

Australian Hass avocados have received provisional access to the Indian market. New access was granted after Australia demonstrated that its high-quality avocados could meet India’s biosecurity and food import requirements.

10 trial shipments will be sent to India during the provisional access period. Full access will be granted if these shipments meet India’s import requirements.

New access was announced in a Joint Statement by the Australian Prime Minister and the Prime Minister of India in March 2023.

The Australian Government is working with the avocado industry to facilitate the ten-shipment trial.

India has a small but growing avocado import market. In 2021-22, India imported
A$4.8 million of avocados, up from A$2.4 million in 2020-21 and A$1.6 million in 2019-20.

Imported avocados are a high-end product in India. They are most likely to enter the hospitality and food service sectors.

India imports avocados from New Zealand at 41 per cent, the EU at 39 per cent and Peru at 17 per cent. All of these exporters are subject to India’s 30 per cent Most Favoured Nation (MFN) import tariff. Under AI-ECTA, tariffs on Australian avocados have been reduced and will gradually decline to 0.

The average import unit price of New Zealand avocados in India in 2021-22 was A$4.81/kg. This is lower than the average unit import price of Australian avocados in Hong Kong (A$5.57kg) and Malaysia (A$5.54/kg) but similar to Singapore (A$4.84/kg).

The announcement was made in a Joint Statement by

Supply Chain, Trade, World

The whole batch contains super creamy Hass avocados, and the units are bundled in 4 kg tray packaging

Leading fruit importer IG International have received an inaugural batch of first-grade Tanzanian avocados from Avo Africa, Tanzania. This is the first-ever shipment of avocado cultivars from the East African nation. The whole batch contains super creamy Hass avocados, and the units are bundled in 4 kg tray packaging. These first-grade fruits will be keenly priced in comparison to the cultivars from other countries, as there is no levied custom duty on their import.

Avo Africa is a part of the Keitt Group of companies. Keitt Exporters prides itself on being the leading grower & exporter of fruits and vegetables to markets in Europe and the Middle East for over two decades now. They are the biggest growers and exporters of avocados from Tanzania and Kenya.

Speaking about the procurement of avocados from Tanzania, Shubha Rawal, COO, Procurement and Marketing, IG International said, “Avocados have established their reputation as a global fruit and are indeed one of the healthiest in the world. Multifarious cuisines are using these ambrosial fruits for preparing exclusive platters. For a long time, India had been bereft of the goodness of creamy Tanzanian avocados. At IG International, we will offer them the joy of biting into a selectively luscious bunch of hass avocados straight from the lush green lap of Tanzania at very fair prices.”

Dipesh Devraj, Commercial and Operations Director, Keitt Group – Tanzania and Kenya said, “In January, a trade prohibition on avocado shipments from Tanzania to India was removed, allowing us to access the Indian fresh produce market. Over the years, our avocados have been adored across the world, and now we wish to introduce them to India. Anyone apart from IG International would not have sufficed as we were only going to approach the best. Their extensive network and our stringent quality control are a winning combination.”

The whole batch contains super creamy Hass