Majid-Reza Pakari, the director for horticulture affairs of the Agriculture Department of the province, has estimated that the province’s pomegranate output will reach 357,000 tons in the current Iranian calendar year (ends on March 20).

Majid-Reza Pakari, the director for horticulture affairs of the Agriculture Department of the province, has estimated that the province’s pomegranate output will reach 357,000 tons in the current Iranian calendar year (ends on March 20).

Stating that there are 25,500 hectares of pomegranate orchards in Fars, the official said Fars province ranks first in the country in terms of cultivated area and production of this product.

The average production of pomegranate in Fars is 15-16 tons per hectare, but in exemplary orchards that follow the patterns of cultivation and development, the production record reaches 95 tons per hectare, he announced.

As stated by Zahra Jalili-Moqaddam, the director-general of the tropical and semi-tropical fruits office of Iran’s Agriculture Ministry, orchard improvement plan was implemented in the pomegranate gardens of the country this year.

She has said that one of the programs of the Horticulture Department of the ministry is the modification and renovation of orchards, which was implemented this year with the efforts of gardeners.

Stating that pomegranates are produced in all provinces except Hamedan, she stated that the area of orchards for this product is 90,000 hectares.

Nearly 40 percent of the country's pomegranate orchards need to be reformed and modernized, and it is necessary to carry out new gardening operations in the orchards, and for this purpose, it is necessary to allocate the funds for the orchard reform and revival plan and pay them at the right time to the gardeners.

The official has predicted that the annual production of pomegranates will reach 1.2 million tons in the country in the current Iranian calendar year.

She considered the quality and taste of Iranian pomegranates unique in the world and said one of the characteristics of Iranian pomegranates is the health of the product and on the other hand its medicinal properties, which are welcomed by other countries.

The director-general of the tropical and semi-tropical fruits office of the Agriculture Ministry further said that the country's average yield of pomegranate production is 14 to 15 tons per hectare and added that last year the exemplary gardeners saw a yield of 80 to 100 tons per hectare.

MA/MA