Turkey grows more dried apricots than anywhere else in the world. Here's how Armenian apricots — grown at altitude on volcanic soil, in small family orchards — actually differ, and what that means if you're buying wholesale.
Turkey is, by a wide margin, the world's largest producer and exporter of dried apricots — the Malatya region alone supplies a large share of the global market, mostly through large-scale, industrial-volume processing. Armenia's apricot industry is a different animal entirely: smaller harvests, mostly from family-run orchards, sold in far lower volumes. That difference in scale shapes almost everything else about how the two compare.
Armenia's apricot orchards sit in high-altitude valleys — the Armavir and Ararat regions in particular — with hot, dry summers, cold winters, and mineral-rich volcanic soil. That combination is often credited with giving the fruit a naturally higher sugar content and more concentrated flavour before it's ever dried, which matters because it means less needs to be added or corrected for afterward.
Turkish apricot production runs at an industrial scale built for high-volume global export, with drying and processing largely mechanised. Armenian production is smaller and slower almost by necessity — orchards are family-owned rather than corporate-run, harvests are picked and processed in smaller batches, and there simply isn't the volume to run the same kind of large-scale operation. That's a trade-off: less consistency of year-round supply, but closer control over each batch.
It's worth being direct about this: sulphur dioxide (E220) is standard practice across the dried apricot industry, in Armenia and Turkey alike, because it protects the fruit's bright orange colour and helps prevent spoilage during drying and storage — our own standard dried apricot uses it for the same reason. Where we differ from most large-scale producers is that we also offer an unsulphured version — the same apricot dried without any sulphur dioxide, which darkens to a deep chocolate-brown as a natural result instead of staying bright orange. Neither is more “real” than the other; it's a genuine choice we can offer because our batches are small enough to run both processes. Read more in our FAQ on sulphur dioxide.
If you're sourcing at very high volume with tight, predictable year-round supply as the top priority, large-scale Turkish production is built for exactly that. If traceability back to specific family orchards, smaller batch sizes, and the choice between sulphured and unsulphured stock matter more, that's where Armenian sourcing — including ours — tends to fit better. Browse our full catalogue for the specifics, or get in touch with your volumes and we'll talk through what's realistic.
Ask us directly — we reply within one working day, and can send lab certificates and specification sheets alongside pricing.
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