Competitively Priced Green Mung Beans from Myanmar

The legumes market, which includes green mung beans, was valued at 44.9 billion USD in 2017 and is expected to increase to 75.8 billion USD by 2025, with a CAGR of 6.77%. The increasing global demand for legumes and green mung beans is driven by the increasing global trend for healthier eating such as gluten-free and vegan diets: green mung bean is a good source of fiber and protein. Both the global gluten-free and vegan market is expected to grow by more than 5% annually over the next decade.

In Myanmar, there are four green mung bean seasons throughout the year, and as a result, green mung beans are available year-round. The main production season runs from January to May in the southern part of the country. Other seasons run from June to July in the upper-middle part, from July to September in the middle part, and from October to December in the lower-middle part of Myanmar.

Myanmar is one of the major mung bean producers and exporters in the world. Green mung beans are mainly produced in the Yangon region in Myanmar. According to Great Luck Co. Ltd., a Myanmarese green mung bean exporter, the annual average production volume of green mung beans in Myanmar is around 300K tons. Due to favorable weather conditions, production volume in 2019 is expected to be higher than in 2018. Myanmar’s production and export volume is expected to increase in the future as major markets such as China and India are decreasing their domestic production. Furthermore, due to China’s trade war with the US, China is turning to other countries for legume imports. This presents an opportunity for Myanmarese green mung bean exporters. In fact, when the announcements of the US-China Trade War were first released in 2017, export prices of Myanmarese mung beans peaked due to a sudden increase in Chinese demand. Since then, the export prices have leveled off. 

One of Myanmar’s main competitive edges is the country’s location between China and India, the two major green mung bean importing countries. Due to this, the logistics of exporting the green mung beans to China and India are relatively simple. Exports to China and India account for around 75% of Myanmar’s green mung bean production. Similarly, the main target markets for Great Luck Co. Ltd. are China and India. In 2018, China accounted for 70% of the company’s total green mung bean exports. The company also exports to Europe, the Middle East, Southeast Asian, and East Asia. The company competes in the international market with quality and price. Myanmarese mung beans are priced lower than mung beans from Australia, Uzbekistan, and Indonesia, states Great Luck Co. Ltd. The quality is high for its competitive price: there is less than 1% of foreign matter and moisture is less than 14%.