The mango crop in Pakistan has met expectations this year. Growers, orchard owners and exporters were expecting a plentiful harvest this season. A record flowering had already been seen in mango trees. There have been no traces of infections of fruit flies in any orchards.
In accordance with the recently announced Trade Policy of Pakistan, the mango exporters expect to reach their target of 215,000 tonnes of export. This is thanks to better packing, training of farmers, bumper yield and the addition of new mango markets like Portugal, Finland, China and Russia.
The current initiative of the TDAP in taking practical action to maximize export potentials of Pakistani mango, and promoting it to non-traditional markets such as CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States), seems to be quite successful. The mango export season is expected to last until the end of September 2016.
This year USAID is also planning to support the cold chain system through its new project AMD (Agriculture Market Development) to increase fruit & vegetable shelf life and durability during the long transit and market displays.
Considering last year's serious food safety concerns, producer organizations from major mango growing regions in Sindh and Punjab are now closely working with the PFVA exporters association. The aim is to procure top quality fruits only from GlobalGAP certified and DPP registered farms. In this partnership, the stakeholders are organizing training sessions for farm owners, exporters, managers and workers to help them learn the SOP’s and protocols in order to increase the export volume of quality fruit.
Japan
Pakistani mangoes have finally made their debut in the Japanese market after passing through all the quality clearances. Pakistan made diplomatic efforts in Japan to gain a foothold in this lucrative market for mangoes.
Last year, 200 tonnes of mangoes were processed with vapor heat treatment before shipment to Japan. An official from Japan’s Agricultural Ministry checked the processed mangoes in Karachi before giving the green light to export this shipment. And not without reason: these mangoes are an official gift to Japanese dignitaries including the emperor, the prime minister and scores of senior officials.
"So far we have not been able to ship huge volume consignments of mangoes to the USA, due to the typical requirements of the irradiation process. It had been announced earlier that if the freight subsidy is available then Pakistan will be exporting good volumes of mango to the US this year; masses anxiously waited for the product due to its exotic taste, as Pakistani mango cannot be matched by any other variety around the world," says mango exporter Imtiaz Hussain.
"Now in Pakistan we have more than 27 hot water plants for mangoes and we are very sure that we will meet our export targets very easily this season."
