"There is still high demand for mangoes in Morocco"

As the Senegalese mango season draws to a close, while Moroccan demand for the fruit remains strong, eyes are now turning to Egypt to supply the Moroccan market. Selle Ndoye, director of FNS Agribusiness and a Senegalese exporter, is exploring his options.

Ndoye says, "Towards the end of the Senegalese season, we saw that there is still high demand for mangoes in Morocco with significant volumes. At FNS Agribusiness, we exported 30 containers of mangoes to Morocco and were very satisfied with the prices. We are now exploring the possibility of sourcing mangoes from Egypt, where the season runs until November."

© FNS

It remains to be seen whether Egyptian varieties will be embraced by the Moroccan market, which is accustomed to Kent and Amélie mangoes. Egypt, which has more than 200 varieties of this fruit, produced limited volumes of Kent mangoes. Most Egyptian exports this season consisted of Keitt, E2R2, and local varieties such as Naomi and Zebdia. Most of the high-quality supply still available at this stage of the season in Egypt, according to an industry source, consists of the local Naomi variety, making it competitive in markets that are still active.

Ndoye comments, "We don't yet know whether Moroccan traders will accept these new varieties for the market, but we hope they will. In any case, the prospecting work we are doing is for the long term. We see that Moroccan demand is characterized by a long duration and lasts well after the end of the West African campaigns. I am traveling to Egypt this week to launch this process."

For their part, several Moroccan importers have stated that the Egyptian option is likely to prove sustainable on the Moroccan market after the end of the West African season, and that it was successfully tested last season. The challenge remains to convince supermarket chains to adopt varieties that are unfamiliar to consumers, a task that is more complicated than marketing to wholesalers.

For more information:
Selle Ndoye
FNS Agribusiness
Tel: +221775530148
Email: [email protected] / [email protected]