diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index 920912353fe9..bc24c8dc6b61 100644
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -133,6 +133,7 @@
     <chill.version>0.3.6</chill.version>
     <codahale.metrics.version>3.0.0</codahale.metrics.version>
     <avro.version>1.7.6</avro.version>
+    <avro.mapred.classifier></avro.mapred.classifier>
     <jets3t.version>0.7.1</jets3t.version>
     <aws.java.sdk.version>1.8.3</aws.java.sdk.version>
     <aws.kinesis.client.version>1.1.0</aws.kinesis.client.version>
@@ -607,6 +608,7 @@
         <groupId>org.apache.avro</groupId>
         <artifactId>avro-mapred</artifactId>
         <version>${avro.version}</version>
+        <classifier>${avro.mapred.classifier}</classifier>
         <exclusions>
           <exclusion>
             <groupId>io.netty</groupId>
@@ -1079,6 +1081,7 @@
       <properties>
         <hadoop.version>2.2.0</hadoop.version>
         <protobuf.version>2.5.0</protobuf.version>
+        <avro.mapred.classifier>hadoop2</avro.mapred.classifier>
       </properties>
     </profile>
 
@@ -1088,6 +1091,7 @@
         <hadoop.version>2.3.0</hadoop.version>
         <protobuf.version>2.5.0</protobuf.version>
         <jets3t.version>0.9.0</jets3t.version>
+        <avro.mapred.classifier>hadoop2</avro.mapred.classifier>
       </properties>
     </profile>
 
@@ -1097,6 +1101,7 @@
         <hadoop.version>2.4.0</hadoop.version>
         <protobuf.version>2.5.0</protobuf.version>
         <jets3t.version>0.9.0</jets3t.version>
+        <avro.mapred.classifier>hadoop2</avro.mapred.classifier>
       </properties>
     </profile>
 
diff --git a/sql/hive/pom.xml b/sql/hive/pom.xml
index 93d00f7c37c9..f530501a205d 100644
--- a/sql/hive/pom.xml
+++ b/sql/hive/pom.xml
@@ -90,6 +90,15 @@
     <dependency>
       <groupId>org.apache.avro</groupId>
       <artifactId>avro</artifactId>
+      <version>${avro.version}</version>
+    </dependency>
+    <!-- use the build matching the hadoop api of avro-mapred (i.e. no classifier for hadoop 1 API,
+    hadoop2 classifier for hadoop 2 API. avro-mapred is a dependency of org.spark-project.hive:hive-serde -->
+    <dependency>
+      <groupId>org.apache.avro</groupId>
+      <artifactId>avro-mapred</artifactId>
+      <version>${avro.version}</version>
+      <classifier>${avro.mapred.classifier}</classifier>
     </dependency>
     <dependency>
       <groupId>org.scalatest</groupId>