'Everything Went Wrong At Once&#8217 : Growers On 2025 Fruit Crisis

Srinagar- For thousands of fruit growers across Jammu and Kashmir, the 2025 apple season unfolded as a slow-moving disaster. What should have been months of harvest, transport and sales instead turned into a chain of setbacks, leaving orchards stocked with unsold produce, markets flooded at the wrong time and growers staring at mounting losses.

From prolonged highway closures during the peak harvest to erratic weather, soaring freight costs and the absence of any compensation, the season exposed the fragile underpinnings of the Valley's fruit economy and pushed it closer to collapse. Growers and traders estimate losses at nearly Rs 2,000 crore, calling 2025 the worst year the sector has witnessed in recent memory.

August rains trigger cascading crisis

The crisis began in the last week of August when continuous and heavy rainfall triggered landslides at several locations along the Srinagar–Jammu National Highway, the Valley's primary all-weather surface link with the rest of the country. The highway remained shut for nearly a month, right at the peak of the apple harvesting season.

Orchards were full and produce was ready for dispatch, but transport came to a standstill. Thousands of trucks carrying fresh fruit were stranded for days and weeks. By the time many consignments reached markets outside Kashmir, a significant portion of the produce had already deteriorated.

Repeated closures and repair work further choked supply lines, causing irregular market arrivals and a sharp crash in prices. Apples continued to pile up in orchards and mandis as growers struggled to move their produce out of the Valley.

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