TEHRAN- Iran has exported 63,000 tons of pistachio in the first half of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21-September 22), which was 8,000 tons more than the figure for the same period of time in the past year, an official with the Agriculture Ministry announced.

Darab Hasani, the director-general of the ministry’s office of cold and dry regions fruits, put the worth of exported pistachios at $426.127 million.

The official stated that 203,637 tons of pistachios worth $1.371 billion was exported in the past Iranian calendar year (ended on March 20), and said that the export is estimated to be about 200,000 tons this year.

As recently announced by the secretary-general of Iran Pistachio Association (IPA), the production of pistachio in Iran is estimated to fall 70,000 tons in the current year.

Hossein Rezaei said that the next year's sprouts have also been destroyed by climate change, and this year it is difficult to keep the market, so government support is required.

“Iran Pistachio Association will announce the exact statistics of pistachio production this year after the end of the harvest, in the eight Iranian calendar month Aban (October 23-November 21), but our estimate is that the output will be 140,000-150,000 tons”, he stated.

Almost 20 percent of Iran’s pistachio is consumed inside the country and the rest is exported, Rezaei stated and announced that 213,000 tons of pistachio was exported during the past eleven months.

China and India were the major export destinations, while ten percent of the product was exported to Germany, he added.

In August 2020, Iran’s Trade Promotion Organization (TPO) held a pistachio export desk meeting to investigate the challenges and barriers in the way of the country’s pistachio exports.

Addressing the meeting, TPO former Head Hamid Zadboum put emphasis on the significant status of pistachio in Iran’s export basket as the top agricultural export item and said that a national view toward removing the pistachio export barriers should be adopted.

In mid-June, Iran’s previous Agriculture Minister Kazem Khavazi said the negative impacts of the coronavirus pandemic and its consequences have imposed serious challenges on the country’s agricultural sector.

Speaking at the 42nd Session of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) Conference which was held virtually, Khavazi said: “The consequences of the COVID-19 crisis have challenged the functioning of the food value chain and the flow of agricultural products into the market and the pandemic has affected all areas from production to processing, packaging, transportation, marketing, and also consumption.”

He further noted that the coronavirus experience has shown that many areas of the food industry have the potential to react early and swiftly to crisis. Many companies have been forced to use alternative channels instead of the usual business approaches; for instance, focusing on new and more local markets, relying on innovative management plans, and investing in human resources to deal with future dilemmas.

The official finally noted that despite all the negative impacts of the coronavirus pandemic the agriculture sector in Iran is consciously thriving and the production of this sector has increased by 22 percent for grains and seeds and over 50 percent for horticulture products.

MA/MA