The almond harvest has started in Lleida with good expectations in terms of sizes and kilos but with uncertainty due to prices, which are going down.
Xavier Cullerés, responsible for the nuts of the agricultural organization JARC, has said that between 5,000 and 6,000 kilos of shelled almonds are harvested per hectare on productive farms with trees between 7 and 8 years old.
These are figures much higher than those of last year when there was hardly any production due to the frosts in April.
Regarding prices, Cullerés explains that 3 euros per kilo of almond grain is being paid and that to go well it should be between 4.5 and 5 euros to be able to “cover expenses”.
The harvest has been brought forward a week due to the heat, in the Tarragona regions they have been harvesting for 10 days.
The Climate Action Department estimates that some 17,430 tons of shelled almonds will be harvested in the Lleida region this year.
This is a much higher figure than last year, which was barely 3,400 tons. This means that almond production will increase fivefold. An increase that is also notable in relation to 2021, when production was estimated at 13,300 tons.
More and more farmers are betting on the almond tree in the regions of Ponent, where the largest volume of production in Catalonia is found, followed by the regions of Camp de Tarragona.
According to data from the Department, there are 20,162 hectares, of which 16,800 are considered productive. The almond tree is a tree that begins to produce the third year after its plantation. It reaches its maximum production from the seventh year.
