Types Of Pistachio
It is said that there are about 90 types of pistachio in Iran; the most famous types are as follows
– Akbari -Ahmad Aghayi – Kaleh Qouchi -Fandoghi -Badami -Momtaz – Shasti -Chorook -Abbasali -Ohadi -Khanjari -Shahpasand and – Green skinned pistachios
Per capita consumption and production of Pistachio in Iran and other countries
According the official statistics provided by International Nut &Dried Fruit Council (INC), types of pistachio has been produced an average of 580,000 MT in the world which Iran and the United States are producing over 200,000 MT as the leading producers in all over the world followed by Turkey, Syria and Afghanistan. The major amounts of pistachios are produced in the mentioned countries and other ones such as Australia and China have fewer shares in this industry.
Almost 70% of Iran’s types of pistachio are exported and only 30% are consumed inside. Consumption per capita of pistachio is around 0.5 (kg/year) in Iran and it is around 0.1 (kg/year) in the world. The United States is the biggest consumer of pistachio an average of 100/000 MT per year in the last five years followed by Turkey 94/000 MT, The UN 63/000 MT, Vietnam 44/000 MT and China 40/000 MT per year.
Pistachio producing Process
When product harvesting is finished, the pistachio production is carried out in a processing system including connected devices and machineries to complete hulling, washing, drying and size separating.
An efficient processing system prevents contamination of healthy nuts in addition to removing contaminated nuts and prepares necessary safeties in order to prevent the spread of contamination in the product.
Pistachio quality control
In order to produce an unmixed product following items are considering in pistachio quality control:
Pistachio Ounce, the percentage of close shell pistachio & open shell pistachio, appearance, percentage of mechanical open shell pistachio and impurities. For more information such as aflatoxin poison rate and product analysis standard laboratory tests are needed.
Pistachio consumptions
Different types of Pistachio are used in following industries:
1-Nut 2-Confictionary, Chocolate, Ice-cream, candy industries 3- Fruit Juice 4- Nougat 5-cooking 6- pharmaceutical Industries 7-Dessert and jams 8- Dyeing industry (using pistachio green skin) 9- Pistachio Oil 10-Others
Pistachio storage:
The storage life of pistachios in warehouses depends on the environment moisture and temperature. On the other hand, before packing pistachios in moisture-proof packages and storing in normal warehouses, its moisture is influenced by the warehouse moisture and reaches the balance. It means that if the moisture content of the warehouse is high, Pistachio easily absorbs it and so the Aflatoxin rate will increases after growing funguses. The lower the oxygen contents of the storage environment, the better the flavor of the pistachio, and the less damage of orangeworm. It is obvious that fumigation for Orange worn control in stored pistachios prevents pistachio contaminations and keeps it healthier.
Pistachio planting areas in Iran
Today, pistachio planting has spread all around Iran. Except northern provinces and a part of the south where the humidity is high, the conditions for the planting of this product are almost suitable in the rest of the country. Major centers of pistachio planting and producing are in Kerman province (Kerman province, Sirjan, Rafsanjan, Zarand, Ravar-Anar, Babak town and …). Khorasan province (Ferdows, Kashmar, Feyzabad, Gonabad, Gain, Sarakhs and …) , Yazd Province, Semnan Province , Alborz Province, Fars Province, Isfahan Province, Qom Province and ….
