Avocados in the USA, grown in Mexico, are known as Green Gold, well, the Province of Granada might actually have its own golden fruit in the form of pistachios.
On the coast and the interior, the main crops are olive and Almonds and the trouble with the former is that when you have a good year’s crop, you get peanuts for them… figuratively speaking, of course. But both are productive secano crops although in the North and North-East of the province,they normally enjoy regular irrigation.
Well, the thing is that several years ago a couple of farmers thought, “Why don’t we grow pistachios because they are not so different from almonds,” and before you can say, Bob’s your uncle, this year’s harvest has begun, concluding next month with a top-quality crop on the way. As for prices… Well, try buying some in the supermarket and see how much they cost.
When the original farmers who had the idea started out, other farmers thought that they had gone crazy, but seeing the results, they’re all planting pistachios like it’s going out of fashion.
It seems that the world loves pistachios and the countries that do produce them aren’t keeping up with worldwide demand. Iran has traditionally been a main producer of pistachios but thanks to Donald & Bibi…
In 2021 Granada had 2,600 hectares of pistachio production, most of which was secano 69.2% vs. 30.8% of irrigated crops. By 2025, it had grown to 4,519 hectares with 3,329 hectares being secano and 1,190 being irrigated.
Actually, the States, together with Iran are the largest producers but the former is facing scarcer harvests due to water scarcity whilst latter is facing a Trump Blight.
Consequently, pistachio farmers in Granada are sitting pretty, especially as most of their hectares are secano so their trees are not thirsty beasts like irrigated ones; thus less affected by low-rainfall years.
So where are these golden acres? Well, Baza and Huéscar are the main producers, but Iznalloz and Alhama have also jumped on the bandwagon of the crop with the greatest future projection in Granada.
(News: Province of Granada, Andalucia)
Keywords: Green Pistacho Gold, Almonds, Olives, Secano, Irrigated, USA, Iran, Hectares
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