Arya.ag enters Himachal’s apple value chain, extending storage, finance and market access to growers and buyers
Arya.ag, India’s largest grain commerce platform, has announced its entry into apples, expanding its horticulture portfolio beyond chillies and onions. The company will bring its technology, grading, storage, finance and commerce capabilities to the apple value chain, beginning this season across key apple belts of Kinnaur, Narkanda, Rohru, Kotkhai and Jubbal.
Arya.ag will work with growers, grower producer organisations and local aggregators to facilitate the movement of graded Himachal apples into organised markets in Himachal Pradesh, Haryana and Punjab. Produce will be assessed at pack houses close to the orchards using AI-enabled grading scanners, with graded lots moved into Controlled Atmosphere (CA) storage and subsequently made available to retailers, e-commerce platforms, processors and institutional buyers as demand emerges through the year.
To support the expansion the company has brought in seasoned professional Nitin Kumar Lal Srivastava, with over two decades of experience with brands such as Namdhari’s and Reliance, to lead the Perishable Fresh Fruits business.
Himachal’s apple harvest runs from July to November, which Arya.ag said forces growers to sell quickly through mandis, often waiting weeks for payment. From December to June, buyers depend on CA-stored apples or imports, with graded Himachal fruit in short supply.
The 2026 crop is forecast at 4.36 lakh tonnes (436,000 tonnes), nearly 40 per cent below 2025, according to Arya.ag, following poor snowfall and inadequate winter chilling.
Anand Chandra, co-founder and COO, Arya.ag, said: “Apples require a very different post-harvest system from grain. Quality has to be assessed early, storage conditions have to be managed precisely, and every movement has to be planned around the characteristics of the fruit. Our focus is to bring these capabilities together so growers have better visibility into the quality and movement of their produce, while organised buyers can access more consistent supply through the season’.’
Alongside storage and commerce capabilities, Arya.ag will extend its commodity-backed finance to the apple value chain.
Registered trading and processing companies will be able to access financing against graded apple inventory held in CA storage, Arya.ag said, so they can secure the quantity and quality they need for the year without tying up full working capital at harvest. While formal credit already exists across parts of the apple cycle, Arya.ag said lending against objectively graded, insured, stored fruit has been rare.
Arya.ag’s model links the loan to a specific lot with a digital quality record, a warehouse receipt and a CA chamber, the same discipline it applies to grain. Because a CA chamber cannot be resealed once opened, stock is released in chamber-sized lots scheduled against buyer demand. This enables processors and other organised buyers to plan procurement and delivery around a defined schedule rather than relying on piecemeal withdrawals.
AI-enabled scanners sort fruit by colour composition, size, and surface defects and generate a digital quality record for each lot. Stock is insured, held under managed temperature and humidity, and tracked through digital warehouse receipts.
Prasanna Rao, co-founder and CEO, Arya.ag, said: “A grain bag can wait a week for a decision. A box of Royal Delicious cannot. Everything we have built for apples, from the pack-house scanners to the chamber release schedule, is designed around that difference. We aren’t applying our grain playbook to fruit; we are building a second playbook on the same platform”.
Apples follow chillies and onions in Arya.ag’s horticulture portfolio. The company’s first-season focus is on domestic demand across India. It intends to continue expanding selectively into high-value crops.
