Recent hail storms in Himachal Pradesh have damaged up to 60 per cent of the apple crop there, but leading distributors have played down the effects of the storms, saying this year's bumper crop could cope.
India's Financial Express reported that over 50 per cent of the apple bloom was damaged in the lower belts of the state.
'The hail storm during the last week was so devastating that a large numberof apple trees were destroyed while apples have got stain marks on them.Almost 50 to 70 per cent of the apple crop has been damaged,' said AK Gupta, the state's deputy director of horticulture.
However, apple distributors contacted by Fruitnet.com said this year's apple crop from the state was a big one, and supplies would not be disrupted.
'There are certainly areas which have been badly damaged. But we've got a quite a large crop this year,' said Sanjeev Sood, of Delhi firm DSF Apple.
'Sixty per cent of the crop could have been damaged by hail, but the amount of clean fruit will be similar to last year's total yield. It's a bumper crop this year.'
Anil Dwivedi, of Dev Bhumi Cold Chain, agreed with Mr Sood's assessment.
'There will be around 50 per cent affected by the hail. Production levels are still good but the quality will be down. In the lower and middle regions quality is down, but in the higher regions it is still very good,' Mr Dwivedi said.
Mr Sood anticipated that even the affected apples would still make it to market, as a lot of the damage was only superficial.
'It is superficial damage and the fruit will still come to the market. There will be plenty of apples into the market, good clean apples and damaged ones, which will keep the prices nice and low,' he said.
Himachal Pradesh has around 1m hectares under apple cultivation, and this year's apple crop is expected to be in the vicinity of 500,000 tonnes.
