Cranberry Beans: export from Canada to ASEAN

Cranberry beans are bought largely for appearance: the mottled cream-and-red pattern is the product, and it fades to a uniform pale colour on cooking, which surprises buyers who have only seen the dry bean. Confirm that the destination application actually wants the dry appearance rather than the cooked one.

The commercial risk is the same as for pinto: pattern definition dulls with age and warm storage, so crop year and storage history are real terms for retail packing.

Specification points are size grade, pattern definition, moisture, foreign material and defect tolerance.

Canadian production is modest and concentrated in Ontario, which sets the routing. Volumes are smaller than for the major beans, so a continuous programme needs forward contracting rather than spot buying, and a buyer should expect availability rather than price to be the constraint in a short year.

As with other dry beans, classification follows species and preparation rather than the marketing name. Send us the form and the destination market and we will confirm the tariff line and duty position against a primary source, with the date we checked it.