Sourcing Calendar: Egypt, Kenya and India — What Ships When

Unitra Foods · Trade insights

No single origin covers a full year. Three do. Here is how Egypt, Kenya and India fit together, and where a buyer still needs to plan.

The value of a multi-origin supplier is not that every product is available every month — it is that when one origin’s season closes, another’s opens, and the buyer keeps one contract, one specification and one point of contact throughout.

Egypt — the winter and spring backbone

Citrus — Navel oranges from December, Valencia into May; mandarins November to February; Star Ruby grapefruit November to March; Eureka lemons all year.
Greenhouse vegetables — Kapia, California, Palermo and Hungarian peppers, cucumbers, eggplant and tomatoes from October to May.
Strawberries — November to April, air and sea.
Summer lines — grapes May to August, mangoes July to October, pomegranates August to November.

Kenya — the year-round complement

Avocados — Hass and Fuerte from March to October, exactly when Mediterranean origins are out.
Chillies — bird’s eye and cayenne available most of the year from the Rift Valley.

India — the grape counter-season

Table grapes — Thompson Seedless and Flame from Nashik, January to April. When Indian grapes finish, Egyptian grapes begin in May, giving buyers a continuous programme from January to August.

Where the gaps are

Peppers and cucumbers thin out in the Egyptian summer; stone fruit and melons are short spring windows; pomegranates are autumn only. We tell you this before you build a shelf plan on it, not after.

How to use this

Send us your annual shelf plan and we will map it against these origins, line by line, and tell you which months can be filled and from where. It takes a day and costs nothing.