Avocado, the superfood with immense health benefits, caught the attention of UK-educated marketing graduate Harshit Godha. This popular fruit became a turning point in his life as he noticed high market demand than available supply and decided to solve the problem. From importing seeds to running ₹1 crore business, let's trace the journey of Director and CEO of Galil Avo India.
What sparked curiosity was the label “Sourced from Israel”, this was a life-changing moment that motivated him to explore avocado farming techniques and directly reach out to Israeli farmers. During this time, Harshit was 22-year-old and was doing an internship in London. As he set out to disrupt the market, he spent a month in Israel to learn about the industry, The Better India reported.
Determined to do something big after gaining hands-on experience, he completed his studies and returned to India. To produce the superfood locally, he invested ₹50 lakh in the venture in 2019 and transformed a 5-acre barren land in Madhya Pradesh's Bhopal to a thriving avocado orchard using a hydroponic system.
Despite the bureaucratic hurdles, delays and multiple roadblocks, Harshit paid no heed to the obstacles and finally after three-year wait imported his first 1,800 saplings. Alongside, he wrote blogs, an e-book, shared his journey on social media, started a YouTube channel to guide aspiring avocado farmers, answered farmers’ questions and built a community around avocado farming.
He established the Indo-Israel Avocado Nursery business in Bhopal in 2021 which has now houses over 20,000 plants. Although farmers in Gujarat, Assam and Sikkim also grow this fruit but his nursery grown plants give better results due to advanced technology, ensuring high-quality, disease-resistant avocado plants.
Israel versus India avocado farming methods
In an interview with BBC, he revealed that his venture, now valued at ₹1 crore, has supplied around 18,000 avocado plants to farmers across India with all of the saplings being international varieties like Hass and Pinkerton.
Traditionally, avocado trees were planted among other crops for shade in India. "Israel grows avocados on approximately 13,000 hectares - a small country with almost no rainfall for eight months of the year. This is precisely why Israeli avocado technology is the most advanced in the world," BBC quoted Godha as saying.
Describing the challenges that come with running a commercial orchard, he said, “When you put in a professional orchard, you have to know the techniques of pruning. A tree can grow up to 25 feet within six to seven years, and harvesting at 25 feet is next to impossible.” According to Godha Israel follows farming methods that are very different from the traditional way of cultivating avocados in India.
Besides "aggressive" pruning for a convenient height, a number of factors have to be considered while planting avocado. Pointing to a botanical detail that can make or break a profitable, high-yielding orchard, he added, “avocado tree cannot easily pollinate itself. To get fruit two different varieties of avocado trees have to be planted right next to each other. One variety needs to be open as a female at the exact same time the other variety is releasing pollen as a male.”
