Taking a look ahead to India’s mango season, Maharashtra crop estimates look to be around 15-20% up on last year with high hopes for a solid export season.

Although it’s still relatively early, mango producers are hoping for a much better year compared with 2015 when widespread crop damage ruined the sector’s export campaign.

Unseasonal rains resulted in production losses of up to 50% in some states.

"It’s very early days in terms of what to expect, however the overall mango crop is looking far better than this time last year when excessive rain eventually devastated much of the fruit crop around India’s major growing regions," a spokesman for the All Indian Mango Growers’ Association tells www.freshfruitportal.com.

"Producers and exporters were left extremely disappointed last year when much of the crop was ruined and even though the EU market was open for Indian mango, there was not sufficient volume to maximize this opportunity.

"We are all hoping 2016 will tell a different story and quantities will be back up to where they should be or at least enough to salvage good volumes of export-ready fruit. Having said that, there is still some time to go and final crops volumes cannot yet be properly calculated."

It’s been a turbulent couple of years for Indian’s mango sector.

In May 2014, the country’s 'king of fruits' was banned in Europe amid contamination concerns. Following a significant number of consignments infested with fruit flies, mango imports were restricted alongside four other categories; two types of gourd, eggplant and the taro plant.

The initial ban was due to last until December 2015 but was lifted early following a large-scale campaign led by British-Indian MP Keith Vaz and backed by the Indian mango sector and U.K. importers who supply the ethnic markets in Britain.

"Maharashtra’s crops are looking good, the quality will be there. We really want to get back into the EU market because that’s where mango fetches the best prices."

According to figures from Agricultural and Food Products Exports Development Authority (APEDA), 4,299 Metric Tons (MT) of mango was exported last year mainly to markets in Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Nepal as well as small quantities to the EU.

www.freshfruitportal.com