Harvest
Farmers wade chest deep through pond water and pull the spined seed pods up by hand. There is no machine for this part. There may never be.
Darbhanga, Bihar / Fox nut / Bulk, retail and private label
Grown in still water. Popped by hand.
BUB International sources raw makhana from pond farmers across the Mithila belt, then grades, roasts and packs it under one roof. Bulk lots for importers. Retail packs for modern trade. Private label for brands that would rather not build a supply chain from scratch.
01
A snack that was already healthy before anyone marketed it that way.
Makhana is the seed of the prickly water lily, harvested from waist deep ponds, sun dried, then popped over open heat until it puffs white. No extrusion. No binder. The nutrition below is what the seed does on its own.
0g
Protein per 100g, roasted and unflavoured
0g
Fat per 100g before any oil is added
0kcal
Energy per 100g, comparable to a light cereal
0%
Share of world makhana that comes out of Bihar
Pond to pack
Nine steps, five of them still done by hand
Wash and sun dry
Seeds are rinsed of pond silt and spread across drying yards until moisture drops far enough for the shell to crack cleanly.
Grade by size
Raw seed is sieved into size bands before roasting. Grading here, not later, is what keeps a finished lot uniform in the bag.
Roast and pop
Seeds hit an iron pan at high heat, then get struck once with a wooden mallet. The kernel bursts out white. The black shell is discarded.
Polish and sort
Popped kernels are polished, then passed under colour sorters to pull out unpopped seed, shell fragments and off colour pieces.
Season or leave plain
Bulk lots ship plain. Retail lots go through a low temperature roast with ghee, salt or spice blends, then straight into nitrogen flushed film.
02
Grades, in the language your buyer already uses.
Makhana is traded by suta, an old unit of length worth roughly 3.17 mm. The grade number is the kernel diameter in that unit, so a higher number means a larger kernel and a higher price. Select a grade to see it at scale.
5 Suta
The everyday workhorse. Good puff, consistent bite, and the grade most retail brands build a 40g pack around.
03
What ships out of the unit.
Four lines. Two go to importers and distributors, two go on shelf.
Raw graded seed
Sun dried, size sorted, unroasted. For buyers running their own roast line.
Jute or PP, 25 kg / 50 kg
Plain popped bulk
Roasted, popped, colour sorted, unflavoured. The base for private label programmes.
Food grade liner, 10 kg cartons
Roasted retail range
Himalayan salt, peri peri, cheese and herb, ghee and jaggery. Nitrogen flushed.
20g / 40g / 80g pouches
Private label
Your brand, our line. Artwork, flavour development, pack format and export documentation.
MOQ 500 kg finished
Mithila belt / Darbhanga, Madhubani, Purnea
04
We buy from the pond, not from the mandi floor.
Most makhana changes hands three or four times before it reaches an exporter. Every hand takes a margin and none of them can tell you which pond the lot came from. BUB buys direct from registered farmer groups in Darbhanga and Madhubani, at a rate agreed before harvest.
- Direct procurement from farmer producer groups, no intermediate trader
- Lot level traceability from pond cluster to finished carton
- Pre agreed harvest pricing, paid inside seven days
- Third party lab testing on moisture, aflatoxin and pesticide residue
05
Documentation is not an afterthought here.
Export paperwork is where most first time makhana shipments stall. We handle the file in house, so a buyer gets the same set every time and customs sees nothing unfamiliar.
HS 1212.99
Tariff line used for fox nut consignments
FSSAI
Licensed manufacturing and packing unit
APEDA
Registered exporter, RCMC on file
21 days
Typical lead time from confirmed PO to gate out
United StatesUnited KingdomUnited Arab Emirates
Saudi ArabiaAustraliaCanadaSingapore
GermanyMalaysiaNew Zealand
06
Tell us the grade and the volume. We will send a sample.
Samples go out within three working days. Courier is on us for the first request.
- Office
- Jaipur, Rajasthan, India
- sales@bub.co.in
- Phone
- +91 89490 57861
- Hours
- Monday to Saturday, 09:30 to 19:30 IST