Bangladesh’s Jackfruit export push to China faces the same obstacles as mangoes

China has formally opened its market to fresh jackfruit from Bangladesh, offering the country’s national fruit access to one of the world’s major jackfruit-importing markets. 

But exporters and agricultural specialists say Bangladesh may struggle to take advantage of the opening unless it can meet demanding Chinese rules governing how the fruit is grown, handled, traced and shipped.

The concerns reflect the structure of jackfruit production in Bangladesh. Unlike mangoes, litchis or pineapples, jackfruit is still grown largely around homesteads and forest-adjacent areas rather than in organised commercial orchards.

Bangladesh also has relatively few export-oriented jackfruit orchards and limited infrastructure for traceability, specialised packaging and storage.

That leaves a gap between the large amount of fruit Bangladesh produces and the system China requires for imports.

The Department of Agricultural Extension, or DAE, estimates that Bangladesh produces about 1.8 million to 1.9 million tonnes of jackfruit a year. Yet roughly 34 to 38 percent of the crop is wasted because of limited domestic demand, inadequate storage and insufficient export opportunities.

China could provide an important outlet for that surplus. Vietnam and Thailand already supply a significant share of the jackfruit entering the Chinese market.

But Bangladesh’s experience with mangoes has made exporters cautious.

Bangladesh and China signed a memorandum of understanding on mango exports in 2024, and shipments began the following year. Around 30 companies reportedly sought permission to export mangoes, but only one received approval because the others did not have their own orchards.

Over the past two years, Bangladesh has exported just six tonnes of mangoes to China.

Exporters fear jackfruit could follow the same path: formal access to a large market but little trade.

High hope and reality check 

During Prime Minister Tarique Rahman’s visit to China in June, the two countries signed an MoU covering jackfruit exports. On July 27, China’s General Administration of Customs issued an announcement formally permitting imports of fresh Bangladeshi jackfruit, subject to phytosanitary requirements.

Those conditions apply across the supply chain.

Jackfruit destined for China must come from orchards operating under Good Agricultural Practices, or GAP, with sanitation, pest monitoring and traceability systems in place. Individual fruits must be bagged to protect them against quarantine pests, including fruit flies and moths.

Registered packing houses must wash, grade and inspect the fruit and remove damaged or pest-infested produce. Packages must include production and registration information, and every shipment must carry a phytosanitary certificate issued by Bangladesh’s Ministry of Agriculture.

Chinese customs authorities will inspect shipments on arrival. Consignments can be rejected, returned or destroyed if inspectors detect quarantine pests, soil, plant residues or violations of food-safety standards.

Abu Noman Faruq Ahmmed, a Global G.A.P.-registered trainer and professor in the Department of Plant Pathology at Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University, told Daily Waadaa meeting those requirements would require changes beginning at the farm level.

“Bangladesh generally exports fruits and vegetables to ethnic markets abroad,” he said, “To enter mainstream markets, we have to fulfil the criteria set by those markets.”

Farmers, he said, need training in export-oriented production, while the country needs more certified orchards and better compliance systems.

Commercial jackfruit cultivation has begun in Bangladesh, but orchards remain relatively scarce.

“We now need to move towards community-based group certification of GAP for jackfruit production,” Ahmmed said. He also called for orchards of specific varieties to be established through grafting.

He said Bangladesh also lacks a dedicated agency or cell to systematically study overseas demand, prices and market requirements, leaving export initiatives insufficiently prepared before market access is secured.

The mango experience, he said, should serve as a warning.

“Even after the announcement, mango exports to China have not been encouraging,” Ahmmed said. Without government action to satisfy Chinese requirements, he added, jackfruit exports could similarly remain limited.

Tapping the potentials 

Razia Sultana, owner of Global Trade Link, an exporter of about 117 types of agricultural products, said the Chinese market nevertheless offered considerable potential.

Jackfruit has one advantage, she said: Bangladeshi farmers generally use little or no pesticide on the fruit. Prices in China are also attractive.

But she said an own-orchard requirement similar to the one imposed on mango exporters would create a serious obstacle.

“Bangladesh does not have jackfruit orchards on that scale,” she told Daily Waadaa. “The government needs to negotiate with China and clarify this issue.”

Sultana, who also exports mangoes, said the requirement that mango exporters have their own orchards did not fit the way Bangladesh’s agricultural trading system works. Farmers generally grow the produce while separate companies handle collection, processing and exports.

“The same condition was imposed for mango exports to China — that exporters must have their own orchards,” she said. “But farmers in Bangladesh do not export directly. As a result, only one company received permission to export mangoes to China.”

Bangladeshi government agencies, she said, should have explained the country’s production and trading structure more clearly during negotiations.

Mohammad Kanchan Mia, proprietor of Arat Agro BD, which exports mangoes, vegetables, fruits and dried foods to the Middle East, Europe, Malaysia and Singapore, said he had seen strong demand for jackfruit during visits to China.

But he raised the same concern.

“The problem is the requirement to have one’s own orchard,” he told Waadaa. “Because of this, mango exports to China have become concentrated in the hands of a single company. The same problem could emerge with jackfruit.”

Mia said he had participated in a fruit fair in Kunming but encountered difficulties securing the necessary approval for China. He also cited registration and quarantine barriers affecting other export markets.

“If registration were made easier and quarantine issues were handled more flexibly, we could have exported large quantities of mangoes to Japan and Australia this year,” he said.

High airfreight costs add another constraint, he said, increasing the importance of government support if Bangladeshi exporters are to compete internationally.

Exporters and agricultural entrepreneurs say some of the problems require longer-term changes to the way jackfruit is cultivated.

Talking with Waadaa, Abu Sayed Al Sagor, managing director of Premium Fruits, said the Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute should develop improved jackfruit varieties alongside existing ones and encourage commercial orchards using grafted plants.

He also called for demonstration and agricultural extension programmes for jackfruit comparable to government programmes supporting other fruits and crops.

“Jackfruit is our national fruit,” Sagor told Daily Waadaa. “But there has been no government initiative to encourage jackfruit orchard development.”

He pointed to Malaysia’s efforts to develop and market durian internationally as an example of how a national fruit can be turned into a globally recognised agricultural product.

But commercial orchards cannot be established quickly.

Implementable steps 

As an interim measure, Sagor said, authorities could identify major jackfruit-producing regions and certify production areas where harmful substances are not used. Because pesticides are generally not applied heavily to jackfruit, he said, creating such a certification system should be comparatively manageable.

The government would then need to persuade Chinese authorities to recognise a system suited to Bangladesh’s fragmented production structure.

Bangladesh has begun taking some steps.

Abdur Rahim, director general of the DAE and director of its Plant Quarantine Wing, told Waadaa that the government was working to expand jackfruit cultivation and commercial activity in Kapasia in Gazipur, one of the country’s major producing areas.

The Hortex Foundation is working on jackfruit cultivation and business development there, he said.

“We demonstrated jackfruit grading, washing and bagging methods there to the Chinese delegation through a video conference,” Rahim told Daily Waadaa.

Bangladesh is also already exporting jackfruit to several European countries through a packing house in Shyampur, Dhaka, he said.

Rahim acknowledged, however, that commercial orchards remain limited.

“Bangladesh does not have many commercial jackfruit orchards,” he said. “We are thinking about this.”

The DAE is working to increase processing and to introduce GAP standards among growers, he added.

The potential economic loss from the existing system is substantial. At annual production of 1.8 million to 1.9 million tonnes and waste rates of 34 to 38 percent, the figures imply that roughly 612,000 to 722,000 tonnes of jackfruit could be lost each year, although the exact amount varies with production and waste levels.

China’s decision has therefore solved only one part of Bangladesh’s export problem: gaining formal market access.

Turning that access into significant shipments will depend on whether growers, exporters and government agencies can create a production and certification system that satisfies Chinese quarantine rules without excluding most of the farmers and traders who currently produce and market Bangladesh’s jackfruit.

The first test will be whether Bangladesh can avoid repeating its mango experience, where approval for access to the Chinese market produced only a small volume of actual trade.

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