A memorandum of understanding on exporting jackfruit from Bangladesh to China was signed during Prime Minister Tarique Rahman's visit to China in June 2026. On 25 June, Bangladesh and China signed a set of memoranda at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing in the presence of Tarique Rahman and Chinese Premier Li Qiang. Agricultural economists and exporters told BBC Bangla the step brought jackfruit exports to the stage of formal approval.
What was signed in Beijing
Mahdi Amin, spokesperson for the Prime Minister's Office, told reporters at the Diaoyutai Hotel in Beijing that one memorandum was meant to facilitate the export of Bangladesh's national fruit, jackfruit, to China. The news agency UNB and the Dhaka Tribune reported on 25 June that 13 memoranda were signed; BBC Bangla quoted Mahdi Amin as saying 17 were signed in all during the visit.
According to UNB, the documents covered investment, trade expansion, human resource development, education, health and media cooperation and Bangladesh's capacity to export to China.
China's interest was not new. In May 2025 China began importing fresh mangoes from Bangladesh for the first time, and in October 2025 the Chinese ambassador in Dhaka said China was working to give jackfruit and guava access to its market.
Jackfruit in world trade and Bangladesh's share
BBC Bangla reported that world jackfruit exports were worth 2 billion US dollars in 2012 and had risen to 3.7 billion dollars by 2023. Vietnam, Thailand, the Netherlands, China and Ecuador together account for 60 percent of world exports, with Vietnam alone holding 25 percent. China is the largest importer and buys most of what it needs from Vietnam and Thailand.
Citing an FAO report, BBC Bangla said Bangladesh's share of world jackfruit exports was only 0.3 percent. About 85 percent of Bangladesh's jackfruit exports went to the United Kingdom, Italy, Canada and France, with the largest part (76 percent) going to the UK.
Jackfruit is the national fruit of Bangladesh. According to Banglapedia, the tree flowers from December to March and the fruit ripens from May to August, and the unripe fruit is also cooked as a vegetable. Figures from the Fruit Research Centre of the Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute (BARI) show that the country produces 8 to 10 lakh tonnes of jackfruit a year, but more than 45 percent of it is wasted because home demand is low and there has been no export outlet.
Dr Md Shafiqul Islam, chief scientific officer at the Fruit Research Centre, told BBC Bangla that mango is the country's first fruit by production, banana second and jackfruit third. He said BARI had released six jackfruit varieties so far. BARI researchers have made vegetable meat, chips, pickles, jelly, ice cream and cake from jackfruit, and a jackfruit leather known as kathalsotto, developed a few years earlier, drew wide attention.
The obstacles to exporting
Dr Mohammad Amirul Islam, dean of the Faculty of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology at Bangladesh Agricultural University, said: "Our total agricultural exports are still not very good. Most of what we export goes to the ethnic market," meaning markets built around a particular community or culture. In his view Bangladesh had not made much headway in Europe because quality was not maintained, and he called for more government investment in quality control and processing.
Mohammad Ruhul Amin, president of the Bangladesh Agro-Based Product Producers and Merchants Association, said jackfruit products were already exported to a few countries, "but the question is how China will take it, because there are some risks in storing and transporting jackfruit." He said Chinese investment or technical help with processing would make it easier. His association once planned a factory in Bangladesh to make jackfruit chips and other foods, but it never went ahead.
Dr Amirul Islam also warned that when exporters get three times the price they try to send everything abroad, while domestic demand and nutrition must matter too. Still, exporters saw the memorandum with China as a chance to open new markets not only for jackfruit but for other Bangladeshi farm products.
Photo: Shahnoor Habib Munmun / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 3.0)
Sources: BBC Bangla, UNB, Dhaka Tribune, Prothom Alo, Banglapedia
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