India largest producer, Mexico biggest exporter of mangoes.
By Deepak Chitnis
WASHINGTON, DC: The US has seen, in recent months, an uptick in imports of produce, particularly mangoes, coming from India, but they are no competition for mangoes from Mexico.
India’s sale of mangoes, specifically Alphonso, also continues to rise even though the prices of its mangoes rises steadily, sometimes costing as much as six times more than the mangoes imported from central and South America. After incurring an 18-year ban, India only began exporting mangoes to the US in 2007, as a result of an agreement reached between Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the George W. Bush Administration; the rise in costs over the relatively short span of just seven years points to several factors at play.
In comparison, Pakistan, meanwhile, only shipped five tons of mangoes globally in 2011, and none to the US, falling considerably short of its government’s expectations when considering that mango is one of the country’s premiere produce goods. This is all in spite of diplomatic efforts between the US and Pakistani governments to facilitate trade between the two countries, especially when it comes to mangoes. The country has, however, found a solution to this problem for the time being by opening up exports to Australia. Known for its notoriously harsh standards on imported produce, Australia’s mango industry is estimated at about 15,000 tons; Pakistan has supplied 2,000 of that.
In addition to the costs of growing and picking the mangoes, there are costs for inspection, air shipment, wholesale costs in the US, as well as irradiation costs. Agencies like the Food and Drug Administration require goods coming from certain countries to undergo a process to check for potential irradiation, fruit flies, and fungi. The costs of this process are ultimately incurred by the consumers who end up purchasing the mangoes, however a November 2012 study by the US Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Division speculates that the effectiveness of the irradiation process will lead to more widespread usage of it, therefore eventually making the cost of the process itself considerably lower than it currently is.
Some Indian store owners, however, say that they haven’t felt the effect of a markup in mango prices.
One grocer, who owns an Indian store in the Washington, DC-metro area and asked not to be identified in this article, said that prices over the past two years have remained largely constant for him; aside from a few fluctuations here and there, he has not faced any kind of major increase in mango price. He does point, however, to the fact that the growing season for Indian mangoes is fairly short — only four to six weeks, he says — and that the shortness of the mangoes’ selling period often means there isn’t enough time for prices to hike steeply within a single season.
In fact, the same store owner — who shared some of details of his 2012 and 2013 invoices with The American Bazaar — actually noticed a decrease in mango prices. This year, the weekly price for mangoes from India (kesar and alphonso) ranged from $26-$30 per case (a case containing 9 or 10 mangoes each), but last year the price was $28-$30. He says he gets three different varieties of mangoes from Mexico, all of which range in price from $6-$9 per case.
And consumers themselves apparently don’t mind paying a little extra for a rabidly popular fruit. US mango consumption grew considerably in the first four years after the US re-opened mango imports from India, according to a July 2011 “Consumer Attitude and Usage” study by the US National Mango Board. Overall consumer satisfaction with mangoes also rose from 54% to 70% in that same span of time.
So then where are mangoes mainly coming from? Mexico, which is now the world’s largest exporter of mangoes, despite India still being the world’s largest mango producer.
According to a National Public Radio (NPR) report from this past April, one in ever 20 mangoes eaten throughout the world now comes from Mexico. Shorter transportation times between the Mexico and US also mean that the US has become Mexico’s largest commercial target; about 80% of mangoes sold in the US come from Mexico.
The rest of the mangoes sold within the US come predominantly from Brazil, Ecuador, Guatemala, and Haiti. Mangoes are also grown in the US — particularly in Florida, California and Hawaii — but these have far shorter shelf lives than the internationally grown varieties, and therefore are generally constrained to local market vendors.
Tea from India has also seen an increase in its American commerce over recent months, so much so that a delegation representing the Indian tea industry will visit the US at the end of September to discuss and explore further commercial possibilities.
Indian tea imports into the US — mostly coming from Kolkata and Darjeeling — have gone up 22.5% since 2003, and are expected to climb a further 3% through 2018. The sale of Indian tea through vendors in the US became a $15.7 billion industry last year, up nearly 32% from where it was five years earlier.
According to the US Census Bureau’s numbers, the total import of “Fruits and preparations, including frozen juices” in 2012 was valued at about $26,363,000, a very minor piece (about 0.065%) of the roughly $40,514,116,000 of total imports from India in that year, indicating that although India is the world’s largest producer of mangoes, their trade market with the US is still practically non-existent in that domain.
The same report also states that tea makes up a slightly larger portion of US imports at $272,813,000, or 0.673%. In terms of total imports of “tea and mate” in 2012, according to numbers from the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), India ranked behind China, Canada, and Argentina. Mate, however, is a tea-like drink that originates predominantly in South America as well as parts of the Middle East; its inclusion with tea skews the figures against India.
1 Comment
Hey there! I could have sworn I’ve been to this site before but after checking through some of the post I realized it’s new to me. Anyhow, I’m definitely happy I found it and I’ll be book-marking and checking back often!