A new agreement closed towards the end of the 2022 season speeds up India’s phytosanitary regulations, allowing cherry shippers in the Pacific Northwest to access a “systems approach,” as reported by goodfruit.com.

Thus, transporters will be able to demonstrate that they follow a continuous method throughout the season to avoid pests and diseases in fruit shipments, which begins in the orchard and continues until export.

This year, as the website indicates, around 10,000 boxes are expected to be sent to Indian ports, leaving behind the fumigation requirements that heat and soften the fruit.

India as market

Currently, India is one of the countries of greatest interest for fruit exporters and even though it does not yet have a market like China (in the case of cherries), experts and producers see high potential in the country for the future for all fruits in general.

In particular, the cherry effort began more than 10 years ago, in 2010, said Riley Bushue, director of congressional relations and export programs for the Northwest Horticultural Council.  This meant years of technical exchanges between the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service and India’s Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, visits to port facilities and orchards, to name a few, to reach an agreement in July of last year.

This article was originally published on Goodfruit.com. You can read it in the link.