Ukrainian apples enter the Indian market

After a successful trial delivery, Ukrainian apple producers can conclude contracts and begin regular fruit exports to India.

In the future, gardeners could supply the Indian market with up to 500 containers of apples per year with a total value of about UAH 0.5 billion, Volodymyr Pechko, head of the Ukrsadvinprom Public Enterprise, told Delo.ua in a comment.

A test batch of Ukrainian apples, which was previously sent to India, confirmed that the products meet the requirements of the local market.

Pechko noted that Ukraine has significant potential for exporting apples to India. Ukraine currently has about a thousand containers of export-oriented apples, but this volume is distributed between various markets, in particular the countries of the Middle East and Europe, including Dubai, the UK and Sweden.

“In reality, we could supply India with about 500 containers of apples per year. This is a total volume of about half a billion hryvnias,” said the head of Ukrsadvinprom.

According to international market research, India imports about 500-560 thousand tons of apples annually for more than $400 million. The main suppliers are Iran, Turkey, Afghanistan and the USA.

At the same time, Ukrainian apple exports are still significantly lower: in the 2024/2025 season, Ukraine supplied only 16.8 thousand tons of products worth $10.1 million to foreign markets.

The industry expects that full-fledged exports of Ukrainian apples to India may begin as early as next year, the expert noted.

Currently, gardeners are interested in the domestic market, where prices are higher than in foreign markets, Pechko added.

Another factor affecting the development of this area is the long logistics time: delivering apples to India takes about two months, which makes supplies at the end of the season risky.

Tags: Ukraine, India, apples