California farmers enjoy pistachio boom, with much of it headed to China

abcnews.go.com:

California farmers have been devoting more land to pistachios, which are seen as hardier and more drought-tolerant in a state prone to dramatic swings in precipitation

LOST HILLS, Calif. — In a sprawling plant in the heart of California's farmland, millions of shells rush down a metallic chute and onto a conveyor belt where they are inspected, roasted, packaged and shipped off to groceries around the world.

Pistachios are growing fast in California, where farmers have been devoting more land to a crop seen as hardier and more drought-tolerant in a state prone to dramatic swings in precipitation. The crop generated nearly $3 billion last year in California and in the past decade the United States has surpassed Iran to become the world’s top exporter of the nut.

“There has been an explosion over the last 10 or 15 years of plantings, and those trees are coming online,” said Zachary Fraser, president and chief executive of American Pistachio Growers, which represents more than 800 farmers in the southwestern U.S. “You are starting to see the fruit of people’s vision from 40 years ago.”

California grows more than a third of the country's vegetables and three quarters of its fruit and nuts, according to state agricultural statistics. Pistachios have surged over the past decade to become the state's sixth-biggest agricultural commodity in value ahead of longtime crops such as strawberries and tomatoes, the data shows.

Much of the crop is headed to China, where it is a popular treat during Lunar New Year. But industry experts said Americans also are eating more pistachios, which were rarely in grocery stores a generation ago and today are a snack food found almost everywhere. They are sold with shells or without and flavors