Indian Fruit Market Continues to Grow

IndexBox has just published a new report "India: Fruits - Market Report. Analysis And Forecast To 2025". Here is a summary of the report’s key findings.

Indian Fruit Market Continued to Grow

In 2016, Indian fruit market amounted to $89.9B in wholesale prices, which was $3.0B (or 3%) more than the year. This figure reflects total revenue of producers and importers (excluding logistics costs, retail marketing costs, and retailers’ margins, which will be included in the final consumer price). Over the period under review, Indian fruit market demonstrated an upward trend with only mild fluctuations. In physical terms, the market reached 90.5M tonnes in 2016, growing by an average +4.8% per year, from 2007 to 2016 (IndexBox estimates).

Fruit Market Is Forecasted to Reach 118M Tonnes by 2025

Fruit constitutes one of the basic food products in India as a result of the country's climate, favourable for fruit cultivation.

The demand for fruits is supported by stable population growth, growth in disposable incomes, continuing urbanization as well as consumers’ needs for healthy eating. According to forecasts, in the coming year, India's economy will grow at a rate of + 7.6%, which is the highest growth rate in the world, which will contribute to raising living standards and an increase in consumption of food, including fruits. Fruits are a staple food for the population with different income levels. Since the country fully meets the needs of the domestic market, and trade does not take any significant share in consumption, the increase in fruit consumption will be determined by the increase in population.

Driven by the continuing growth of population and disposable income growth, fruit sector is expected to continue enjoying strong consumer demand. Therefore, the performance of the market is forecast to grow with an anticipated CAGR of +3.0% from 2016 to 2025, which is expected to bring the market volume to 118M tonnes by 2025.

Indian Fruit Output Continues to Increase against the Background of Growing Areas under Fruit Cultivation

Indian fruit production increased from 59.2M tonnes in 2007 to 90.4M tonnes in 2016, experiencing an average growth by +4.8% per year, over the last nine years. Within the period from 2013 to 2016, production has steadily grown at a pronounced pace, which was preceded by a softer and less stable dynamics. The growth of production was associated with expansion of harvested area for fruit production, which grew by 39% over the period under review. At the same time, fruit yield fluctuated slightly, amounting to 12.5 tonne/ha in 2016.

Bananas Ranked First in Indian Fruit Output

India is one of the leading fruit producing countries. Bananas accounted for the highest share (32% in 2016) of Indian fruit production, followed by mangoes, mangosteens, guavas (23%), fruits, nes (13%), oranges (10%), papayas (7%), grapes (4%), lemons and limes (4%), pineapples (2%), apples (2%).

The most notable growth in Indian fruit production from 2007 to 2016 was attained by papayas (+9.4% per year), oranges (+9.0%), grapes (+8.9%) and fruits, nes (+7.1%), while the other major producing categories experienced more moderate paces of growth.

The Market Share of Imported Fruits Was Insignificant 

The share of imported fruits in terms of total fruit consumption in India accounted for less than 1% over the analysed period. This indicates the absolute independence of India from fruit imports.

Indian Fruit Imports Increased over the Last Years, Mostly due to Growth of Supplies from China

The volume of total Indian fruit imports totalled 734K tonnes in 2016, which equated to $628M in value terms. Import volume expanded at an average annual rate of +8.9% over the period under review. There was a pronounced growth of imports in 2016, after a slight decline the year before.

China, Pakistan and Iraq remain key suppliers of fruits in India, each accounting for 20% of total Indian imports in 2016. Egypt (7%) lagged far behind Iraq in terms of the volume of imports, followed by the U.S. (7%), Iran (5%), Chile (5%), the UAE (3%), New Zealand (2%), Italy (2%). 

From 2007 to 2016, Italy (+36.9%), China (+22.0%) and New Zealand (+17.3%), had the highest growth rates of imports. The shares of Iran (-37 percentage points), Pakistan (-9 percentage points) and the U.S. (-2 percentage points) showed a negative trend, while the shares of China (+13 percentage points) and Italy (+2 percentage points) increased from 2007 to 2016. The shares of the other countries remained relatively stable throughout the analysed period.

The UAE, the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, Nepal and Bangladesh Were the Key Foreign Market for Indian Fruits

India exported 610K tonnes of fruits in 2016, which equalled to $607M; this number, however, accounted for less than 1% of Indian fruit output. The volume of exports roller-coasted from 2007-2016; overall, there was an upward trend pattern of exports. Since exports had only a small share in the total output, it hardly can be considered as a major driver of the fruit industry.

In 2016, the UAE (19% of total exports) constituted the main destination of Indian fruit exports, followed by the Netherlands (12%), Saudi Arabia (11%), Nepal (10%), Bangladesh (9%), the UK (6%), Kuwait (4%), Russia (3%), Iran (3%) and Oman (3%). Iran (+48.1%), Oman (+21.0%), Russia (+17.1%), Kuwait (+9.6%), the Netherlands (+7.4%) had high growth rate of imports. Bangladesh showed a negative trend, dropping by -7.8%, over the last nine years.

From 2007-2016, the share exported to Nepal, Kuwait, Russia, Oman (+2 percentage points, each), Iran (+3 percentage points) and the Netherlands (+4 percentage points) increased, while the share shipped to Bangladesh (-15 percentage points) and Saudi Arabia (-3 percentage points) demonstrated a negative trend. The shares of the other countries remained relatively stable throughout the analysed period. 

Do you want to know more about the fruit market in India? Get the latest trends and insight from our report. It includes a wide range of statistics on

• fruit market share
• fruit prices
• fruit industry
• fruit sales
• fruit import
• fruit export
• fruit market forecast
• fruit price forecast

Source: India: Fruits - Market Report. Analysis And Forecast To 2025