By Sadbhaav Spices | Published: March 2026 Read Time: ~10 minutes
The world is watching South Asia closely. In May 2025, India launched Operation Sindoor — a series of precision military strikes on terror infrastructure inside Pakistan — triggering the most serious India-Pakistan military escalation in decades. For global spice importers, food manufacturers, and procurement heads sitting in Europe, the US, or Southeast Asia, one urgent question surfaced almost immediately:
Is India still a safe, reliable source for bulk spices?
The short answer is yes — and the data backs it up convincingly. But let’s unpack exactly why, and what you, as a buyer, need to know right now.
The Conflict in Context: What Actually Happened
Following the tragic April 2025 Pahalgam terror attack that killed 26 civilians in Kashmir, India suspended the Indus Waters Treaty, banned all imports from Pakistan, and on May 7, 2025, launched Operation Sindoor — striking nine terror targets across Pakistan-held Kashmir and Pakistan’s Punjab province.
The geopolitical fallout was swift. Pakistan closed its airspace, banned Indian vessels from its ports, and suspended bilateral trade entirely. Shipping companies rerouted vessels. War risk insurance premiums in the Arabian Sea reportedly surged from a nominal 0.05% to as high as 1% of a vessel’s insured value. Some major carriers stopped calls to Karachi.
Global supply chain anxiety was understandable.
But here’s what the headlines missed: India’s export infrastructure never stopped.
India’s Export Ports: Operational, Stable, and Far From the Conflict
Geography is your first reassurance. India’s major commodity export ports — Mundra, Nhava Sheva (JNPT), Kandla, Pipavav, Cochin — are located hundreds of kilometres from the Pakistan border and the conflict zone.
As shipping intelligence firm AIV Private Limited confirmed during the crisis, all ports in India, including those close to the Pakistan border, remained fully operational. Vessels were berthing, loading, discharging, and sailing without disruption.
Sadbhaav Spices is headquartered in Palghar, Maharashtra, in the heart of western India, with direct access to Nhava Sheva and Mundra ports. These are among the busiest, best-connected container terminals in Asia. No conflict-related disruption touched these corridors in 2025.
If you were sourcing from Pakistan, the story would be very different. Karachi — handling approximately 60% of Pakistan’s sea trade — was effectively isolated as major carriers including MSC and CMA CGM suspended or rerouted Karachi-bound services. For India? Business continued.
The Numbers Don’t Lie: India’s Spice Exports Are at an All-Time High
While geopolitical noise dominated the headlines, India’s spice trade data told a different story entirely.
India exported spices worth USD 4.72 billion in FY 2024–25 — a record high. This followed another record of USD 4.46 billion in FY 2023–24, representing an 88% growth in export volumes and 97% growth in value over the past decade. In the first four months of FY 2026 alone (April–July 2025), India had already exported spices worth USD 1.6 billion.
India supplies spices to over 200 countries worldwide, exporting 225+ unique spice products — from raw whole seeds to value-added ground blends. Its top buyers include China, the USA, the UAE, Bangladesh, Thailand, Malaysia, UK, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, and Germany.
The US alone imported USD 711 million worth of Indian spices in FY 2024–25, up from USD 619 million the year before. That’s not the buying behaviour of a market hedging its exposure — it’s the behaviour of a market deepening its commitment.
No other country comes close. India produces approximately 75 of the 109 spice varieties recognised by the ISO, grows over 12 million metric tonnes of spices annually, and accounts for roughly 9% of India’s total agricultural exports. This is structural dominance, not coincidental market share.
What Makes India Geopolitically Safer Than You Think
There’s a fundamental difference between a country involved in a conflict and a country whose export operations are disrupted by that conflict. India is the former. It is not the latter.
Consider this critical comparison:
Pakistan depends on Karachi — a single port that handles 60% of its trade — which was directly impacted by the conflict, shipping bans, and carrier route changes. Its economy ($348 billion GDP) was already fragile before the hostilities began.
India is a $4.2 trillion economy with multiple deepwater ports across three coastlines. Its trade with Pakistan was a mere 0.06% of its global trade. The economic impact of severing ties with Pakistan on India’s export ecosystem was, in the words of trade analysts, “negligible.”
India has also maintained its trade relationships with virtually every major importing nation throughout the conflict. The US-India trade partnership deepened. EU-India negotiations continued. ASEAN ties remained intact.
Furthermore, India’s Spices Board — a government body specifically dedicated to spice quality, export support, and certification — remained fully operational, continuing to issue phytosanitary certificates, support exporters, and facilitate customs clearance throughout the period.
But What About Shipping Insurance and Freight Costs?
This is a legitimate concern — and importers deserve a straight answer.
Yes, war risk insurance premiums in the Eastern Arabian Sea did rise during the peak of the India-Pakistan tension in May 2025. Maritime insurers elevated threat assessments from “low” to “moderate” for the region. International voyages near Indian waters became slightly longer and costlier as vessels added buffer routes.
However, two important caveats apply:
First, the ceasefire between India and Pakistan was announced on May 10, 2025 — just three days after Operation Sindoor — mediated by the United States. The acute shipping risk window was extremely short.
Second, even during the conflict, the primary disruptions were concentrated around Pakistan’s coastline and the Karachi-to-Gulf route — not India’s western ports. India’s freight routes to the US, Europe, East Africa, and Southeast Asia were not fundamentally altered.
For buyers placing orders today in 2026, these insurance premium spikes are historical data, not active pricing concerns. India’s shipping corridors are operating normally.
Why Direct Sourcing From Indian Manufacturers Matters More Now
If the conflict has taught global importers one thing, it’s this: the closer you are to the source, the less exposed you are to the chaos of the middle.
Multi-hop supply chains — where spices pass through traders in Dubai, re-labelled in Colombo, and reshipped from Singapore — add cost, delay, and opacity at every step. In stable times, that’s merely inefficient. In geopolitically volatile times, it’s a serious risk to supply continuity.
Direct sourcing from a certified Indian spice manufacturer like Sadbhaav Spices eliminates that exposure. Your spices move from Gujarat or Maharashtra farms directly to the processing facility, get packed under certified conditions, and ship from Mundra or Nhava Sheva on confirmed carrier vessels.
No middlemen in Dubai rerouting containers. No ambiguity about origin. No compliance gaps.
This is exactly why European food brands and US distributors accelerated their direct India sourcing strategies during and after the 2025 tensions. Trade disruption doesn’t reduce demand for spices — it increases urgency around sourcing resilience.
India’s Quality Certifications: A Compliance Moat That Competitors Can’t Match
Beyond supply continuity, India’s regulatory infrastructure makes it the lowest-risk sourcing decision from a compliance standpoint.
India’s Spices Board operates under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry and has established eight crop-specific Spices Parks across the country — integrated facilities covering cleaning, sorting, grading, grinding, oil extraction, and packaging. The SPICED scheme (Sustainability in Spice Sector through Progressive, Innovative, and Collaborative Interventions for Export Development), backed by an outlay of Rs. 422.30 crore, specifically focuses on food safety compliance, traceability, and value-added export development.
Sadbhaav Spices holds certifications including APEDA registration, IEC (Importer-Exporter Code), and GST compliance — the foundational trifecta that European and American importers expect from a verified supplier.
For buyers navigating stricter traceability requirements in the EU, UK, and US markets, sourcing from a certified Indian manufacturer isn’t just operationally smart — it’s compliance protection.
The Strategic View: Why 2026 Is a Buying Opportunity, Not a Risk
Here’s the counterintuitive truth that smart procurement teams already understand: periods of geopolitical volatility are often the best times to lock in long-term supply agreements with established manufacturers.
Reasons:
Price stability windows open briefly. When uncertainty spikes, buyers hesitate and order volumes temporarily dip. Manufacturers offer more favourable pricing and better MOQ flexibility to maintain throughput. That window doesn’t stay open long.
Competitor supply chains are vulnerable. If your competitors are still sourcing through multi-country intermediaries, a brief disruption costs them 6–12 weeks of delay. A buyer with a direct manufacturer relationship doesn’t skip a beat.
India’s export growth trajectory is unchanged. With the Spices Board targeting USD 10 billion in exports by 2030 and the domestic market projected to reach USD 26.95 billion by 2033, India’s spice infrastructure investment is accelerating — not retreating.
The global market is growing regardless. The global spices and seasonings market reached USD 29.49 billion in 2025 and is projected to reach USD 50.85 billion by 2035. The demand equation hasn’t changed. Only the sourcing map is being redrawn — and India remains the anchor.
What Sadbhaav Spices Offers to Global Importers
Sadbhaav Spices operates from Palghar, Maharashtra, with full container shipment capabilities, in-house processing, private label options, and direct access to India’s western port corridor.
Our product range covers the full spectrum of bulk Indian spices and seeds that global buyers depend on:
- Whole Spices: Cumin Seeds, Coriander Seeds, Fennel Seeds, Fenugreek Seeds, Dill Seeds, Ajwain Seeds
- Ground Spices: Cumin Powder, Coriander Powder, Fennel Powder, Garam Masala
- Oil Seeds: Natural Sesame Seeds, Hulled Sesame Seeds, Black Sesame Seeds, Black & Yellow Mustard Seeds
- Herbs: Psyllium Husk
Every batch is processed under certified, hygienic conditions with quality controls aligned to international food safety standards.
Whether you need FCL (Full Container Load) shipments, private labelling for your brand, or flexible bulk packaging options — our team is ready to discuss terms, timelines, and pricing transparently.
The Bottom Line
Geopolitical events are, by nature, unpredictable. The India-Pakistan tensions of 2025 were real, serious, and disruptive — primarily to Pakistan’s trade infrastructure and to regional logistics confidence.
But India’s core spice export capability — its farms, its processing facilities, its certified exporters, its port infrastructure — emerged from the conflict without meaningful disruption. Export volumes reached record highs. Buyer relationships deepened. Demand from the US and Europe grew.
India is not just the world’s largest spice producer, consumer, and exporter. It is the world’s most resilient spice ecosystem — and that resilience has been tested, repeatedly, by events far more disruptive than 2025.
The question isn’t whether India is safe to source from.
The question is whether you can afford not to.
Ready to secure your bulk spice supply? Get in touch with the Sadbhaav Spices team today. 📧 info@sadbhaavspices.com | 📞 +91 7397993793 🌐 www.sadbhaavspices.com
Sadbhaav Spices is a certified Indian spice manufacturer and exporter based in Palghar, Maharashtra. We supply bulk cumin seeds, coriander seeds, fennel seeds, sesame seeds, garam masala, and more to importers, distributors, and food manufacturers worldwide.