Why India imports apples despite record production, and how to fix it

A kilo of apples can cost ₹80 in September and ₹220 by January, even in a year when India produces a record crop. Jammu and Kashmir, which grows roughly three-quarters of India’s apples, harvested more than 21 lakh tonnes in 2024-25. Yet India imported close to 5.6 lakh tonnes of apples, equal to a fifth of India’s domestic production, during the same period for an import bill of $418 million. The import bill has risen almost fortyfold from under $10 million 20 years ago.

Set those numbers side by side and two questions surface that most coverage steps around: if India is growing record quantities of apples, why is it importing more of them than ever? Why does so much home-grown fruit still fail to earn what it should?

The easy answer: India does not grow enough. But the data says otherwise. The problem is not only how much India harvests. It is also the shape of the year. India produces a flood of fresh apples for roughly four months, from the August-to-November harvest, then spends the other eight months drawing down cold stores and topping up with foreign fruit. 

The waste and the import bill are deeply connected. Both reflect India’s inability to preserve, grade, process and market enough of its crop beyond the harvest season. Call it the eight-month gap.

And the way to close it is not to fight the seasons–which no one can–but to break the link between when an apple is harvested and when it earns its money.

The scoreboard first

Before we peel back the history, here’s the full basket in a single view.

Two comfortable stories, both incomplete

Most writing on Indian apples tells one of two stories, and both are true. The first is the crisis story: climate swings, freak hailstorms, cheap imported fruit and thinning margins are squeezing the grower from J&K. The second is the miracle story: a self-taught farmer has bred an apple that fruits in 45-degree heat and apple cultivation is spreading to 29 states. Each captures something real, and each has moved policy and investment in useful directions. What tends to fall between them is the connective tissue: the reason imports find a ready market and the reason a hardy new variety matters both trace back to the same underlying issue, which is timing and value capture. Imports also compete on appearance, texture, grading, variety, consistency and packaging. But the calendar decides when that competition becomes most intense. It is a less dramatic lens than crisis or miracle, but a more actionable one. The encouraging part: it points to problems India already holds most of the tools to solve.

The calendar, explained

Kashmiri apples come off the tree between roughly August and November. The chief varieties, Red and Royal Delicious, Golden Delicious, Ambri, Maharaji and others, ripen in that narrow band. Once picked, an apple pulled from a cold store holds its quality for only about 8 to 10 days at room temperature, and less when the mercury climbs past 40 degrees. That short fuse is the hinge on which the whole economy turns.

For those few months, mandis across the country are awash with domestic fruit and prices sag. For the remaining two-thirds of the year, fresh domestic supply is thin, and the shelves are filled by imports: Iranian and Turkish apples at the value end, American, Italian, Polish and New Zealand fruit higher up. India levies a 50% import duty and permits apple imports only above a floor price of ₹50 a kilo. Even after the tariff, landed costs sit at roughly ₹77 a kilo for Iranian fruit and around ₹125 for American. Importers pay it because, in the lean months, there is a paying customer and not enough Indian fruit in sellable condition to serve them. The imports are not simply a verdict on whether India can grow enough apples. They reflect when Indian apples are available, how consistently they are graded and packed, which varieties consumers want and whether the fruit can reach distant markets in good condition. 

The storage story has quietly moved on

The most repeated line about Kashmir Valley is that it has no way to preserve its fruit. That was largely true a decade ago. It is becoming less true, and fast. Lassipora in Pulwama alone now holds 83 controlled-atmosphere stores with a combined capacity near 3.45 lakh tonnes; Shopian adds about 50,000 tonnes, and other districts another 75,000. More than 20 new projects are under construction, which would push the Valley's controlled-atmosphere capacity toward 6 lakh tonnes. Here is the part the crisis story misses. Industry estimates suggest that roughly one-third to 40% of the crop may qualify for premium sale or longer-term storage in a normal season, although the proportion varies with weather, variety, harvesting practices and the grading system used.

If a significant share of this fruit is sold immediately after harvest, the volume that economically justifies controlled-atmosphere storage may be closer to the capacity now being built than the total crop figure suggests.

Growers who once dumped fruit on the highway at throwaway rates can increasingly choose when to sell, and in early 2026, an estimated 60% of stored volumes were still being held back for better prices. However, early data from the 2025-26 season suggests that while the gamble often pays off for high-grade fruit held in top-tier CA stores, smaller growers with inferior storage or lower-grade lots frequently saw their margin eroded by weight loss, quality degradation, and financing interest. This underscores that 'holding back' is a sophisticated financial decision, not a guaranteed profit. Some chambers now sit partly empty even at peak season, and a few operators are struggling with high costs and slower returns. The sector's newest headaches are those of a maturing industry rather than an absent one: in June 2026 the Pollution Control Committee served closure notices on eleven Lassipora units for running without the mandatory wastewater-treatment infrastructure, a sign that the question has moved on from whether the Valley has cold storage to whether that storage is being built and run to standard. 

For premium fruit, capacity is no longer the only question. Utilisation, affordability, access for smaller growers, sorting, packaging, financing and post-storage distribution are becoming equally important. The frontier has shifted. Where has it shifted to? To the fruit that never makes A grade. Some assessments of the 2025 crop reported that nearly 30% fell into B and C grades, although such estimates are not directly comparable with broader A-grade figures because sources use different seasons and grading definitions. Growers holding this lower-grade fruit struggled to recover even their costs. Controlled-atmosphere storage does nothing for that fruit, because storing a low-grade apple only delays the moment it disappoints. The unglamorous truth is that India has been getting better at preserving its best apples while still having almost nowhere useful to send its ordinary ones. That, not a shortage of chambers, is the live problem.

How the rest of the world beat the same four-month harvest

Here is the fact that should reframe the entire Indian debate: no leading apple producer wins by growing for longer. Washington (grows roughly 60% of the US’ apple supply), Poland, Chile and the rest all pick their fruit in roughly the same short autumn window that Kashmir does. What separates them is that each has built a business on top of that constraint, breaking the link between harvest and revenue in one of three ways.

Store it. Washington apples are on shelves 365 days a year. American agricultural data credits controlled-atmosphere storage with stretching the domestic marketing window from about three months to nearly year-round. Washington now has the largest such storage capacity of any growing region on earth, holds many varieties in good condition for 12 months or longer, and ships them to market between January and September. On top of the storage sits a coordinated regional identity. Washington produces most of America’s fresh apples and exported about 29% of its own crop in the 2024-25 season, supported by common quality standards, marketing systems and access to international markets.

Time it. Because the Southern Hemisphere harvests between February and July, Chile, New Zealand and South Africa supply fresh apples during the Northern Hemisphere's off-season, and that timing lets them command premium prices. It is why American supermarkets switch to Chilean and New Zealand fruit each spring and summer. New Zealand in particular plays a premium, branded game with varieties such as Jazz and Envy. Washington has pursued a comparable branded-variety strategy with Cosmic Crisp, which was developed by Washington State University. The lesson is blunt: the money is in when and what, not how much.

Transform it. China, Poland and Turkey together account for well over half of the world's concentrated apple juice exports. Add Ukraine and four countries supplied about 63% of export volume in 2023. Poland, a major grower, industrialised juice and concentrate for export; China turned sheer scale into the world's largest processing base. As Chinese domestic consumption rises and its export orientation falls, that leadership is now loosening, opening room for others. India, despite being one of the world's larger apple growers, has not yet built a processing industry proportionate to the size of its harvest and continues to depend on imported concentrate in parts of the country.

Line the three up and a single pattern emerges that Indian coverage rarely states plainly: the eight-month gap is not a problem unique to Kashmir's geography. It is the same four-month harvest every one of these countries has, and each has already turned it into an industry. India has simply not built those industries yet at sufficient scale.

The year-round dream, assessed honestly

This is where the miracle story enters, and it deserves both respect and scrutiny. Hariman Sharma, a Bilaspur farmer honoured with the Padma Shri, developed HRMN-99, a low-chill apple that sets fruit with only 150 to 200 chilling hours and survives summer highs of 40-45 degrees. Saplings have travelled to 29 states and union territories. As a feat of grassroots plant breeding and as proof that apples need not be a hill monopoly, it is genuinely remarkable.

The caveats matter just as much, and they are rarely printed. HRMN-99 is not a year-round apple; it typically ripens around June, which makes it an early-season fruit, not a perpetual one. Its shelf life is short, on the order of 7 to 12 days, and horticulturists quietly question whether its taste and texture compete with premium temperate varieties or are better suited to processing. The claim that it grows in 29 states describes survival and trial plantings, not commercial orchards at scale. So its real contribution is not to replace Kashmir. It is to do two useful things: stretch India's domestic apple calendar by adding a June fruit, and supply raw material for processing. Seen that way, HRMN-99 is one lever in a calendar strategy, not a silver bullet, and the same logic applies to the high-density, low-chill orchards, often on imported rootstock, now being planted in the plains and lower hills to widen the harvest window and lift yields.

Where the billion dollar value pools actually are

The opportunity is not concentrated in one business. It is a stack of three pools and each has a proven international model behind it.

Pool one: the import bill India is already paying. The roughly $418 million of apples India imports each year clusters in the lean months, exactly the window Washington and the Southern Hemisphere exporters have learned to serve. That demand exists today; it is lost partly on timing. Even capturing a third of it, by pairing storage with a treatment such as 1-MCP that stretches post-store shelf life from about 10 days to as many as 25, is well over $100 million of demand brought home. This is the most solid number in the piece, because it is not a forecast; it is a bill India is currently paying for imports.

Pool two: the better price on fruit already in store. A grower forced to sell at harvest and one who releases three months later are not selling at the same price. The gap is real, which is why 60% of stored volume was being held back for price in early 2026. Across the premium fruit that can be stored economically, even a modest improvement in seasonal price realisation can produce significant additional income. But the gain must be measured after deducting storage charges, financing costs, weight loss, spoilage and the risk that prices do not rise as expected.

This is the Washington storage-and-brand model, applied at home.

Pool three: lower-grade fruit that currently earns nothing. The roughly 30% of the crop that may fall into lower commercial grades in a difficult season (grades B or C) is the single largest pool of stranded value in the system, and cold storage does nothing for it. Juice, concentrate, cider, dried snacks and vinegar give that fruit a floor price and a twelve-month shelf life. A competitive domestic processing industry can replace some imported concentrate while creating entirely new consumer markets. This is the Poland and China transform-it model, and it is the least developed and potentially the biggest part of the prize.

The lever beneath all three: quality at the source. The highest-leverage move of all happens before the apple is even picked, by raising the share of the crop that grades A above a third. That converts waste into premium fruit at the origin and makes every pool above work better. This is the ground being explored by agritech firms such as Srinagar-based Orchardly, which combines sensor and data-based advisories, disease prediction, mandi-price information and procurement.

The real test for these businesses is whether such tools measurably raise the share of premium fruit, reduce losses and improve grower realisations at scale. Better decisions in the orchard are the quiet precondition for storing smarter, pricing better and processing the rest.

The honest counterarguments and the charm of consuming imported apples

None of this is guaranteed. The controlled-atmosphere segment already shows early signs of overbuilding for A-grade fruit, so fresh capital there may earn less than the first movers did. Additional capacity also does little if smaller growers cannot afford it, reach it or finance the months between harvest and sale. Low-chill varieties still carry real questions on taste and consistency, and consumers who can tell the difference will pay for it. Processing is capital-hungry and competes with cheap global concentrate, so it needs scale and branding to work. There is also a difference of purpose worth stating: Chile and New Zealand built their industries for export, while India's apples serve a vast domestic market, so India's first prize is import substitution and reducing waste rather than overnight export dominance. Nor are all imports caused by seasonality. Affluent consumers and institutional buyers may prefer imported varieties for their appearance, crunch, size, colour or consistency even when Indian fruit is available. The psychological premium for imported fruit is not merely about scarcity; it can often be a sensory and status-driven calculation. Imported apples may also command a premium because buyers associate uniform colour, size, texture and packaging with quality. Closing the calendar gap must therefore be accompanied by better sorting, packhouses, branding and post-storage handling. Otherwise, some of the preference for imported fruit will persist even when domestic apples are available. Closing the calendar gap will therefore not eliminate imports, but it can reduce the portion driven by seasonal scarcity and inconsistent supply.

And the whole system remains exposed to weather: the 2025 season was scarred when heavy August rain triggered fruit drop and blocked the Srinagar-Jammu highway, stranding thousands of apple-laden trucks and pushing anxious growers into a premature, poorly graded harvest. These are structural vulnerabilities in logistics and market design, and they are the sort of thing no single variety or chamber solves on its own.

From growing more to owning the year

The encouraging part is that the scaffolding is going up. Storage capacity is being expanded under the Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture, backed by central assistance and top-up funding from the Union Territory's own capital budget. Active efforts are on to draw private investment into cold chains and to create horticulture-specific industrial estates beyond the existing hubs. The direction of travel, toward better-utilised storage, more processing and more scientific cultivation, is the right one. For decades the instinct has been to ask how to grow more. The more valuable question, and the one that turns a proud harvest into a durable industry, is how to own more of the year: how to keep a Kashmiri apple sellable in March, how to give an ordinary apple a second life as juice, how to add a June crop to an August-to-November calendar. Every serious apple economy in the world has answered some version of that question. India has the fruit, the market and now the policy momentum to answer it too. When it does, the import bill starts to shrink, the wasted fruit starts to earn, and the eight-month gap starts to close, not through one breakthrough, but through a better-designed supply chain.

Edited by Adith Charlie