Production Practices and Quality Assessment of Food Crops. Vol. 1

2. WORLD AREA OF CHESTNUT AND PRODUCTION
2.1. Areas of chestnut in the world
There are three main areas of chestnut growing in the world (Table 1): (1) Asia being
the most important, mainly in China, where C. mollissima is found in the wild as
well as in cultivation. (2) Europe and Turkey is the second main area where C. sativa
is predominant. (3) In North-America C. dentata was widespread naturally but
nowadays it is being substituted by hybrids with resistance to blight.
According with the FAO (Tables 1 and 2), 289,000 ha of orchards in the world
produce 1,800,000 t of chestnuts. China being the most important country in chestnut
production with 110,000 ha, but some author (Liu and Zhou, 1999) estimated 670,000
ha, seven times the FAO figure. In France only 5000 ha (Table 1) out of one
million ha is cultivated (Morandini, 1958; Bourgeois, 1992; Breisch, 1995). In Spain,
chestnut occupies 130,000 ha, more than 46,000 ha is cultivated, but only part of
the production (18,000 t) comes to the market (Pereira-Lorenzo and Fernandez-
Lopez, 2001).
Recent chestnut areas are localised in South-America, New Zealand and Australia.
In Chile, seedlings were introduced from Europe after 15th century (Grau and France,
1999).
In New Zealand chestnut crop is developing rapidly and is mainly based on C.
crenata × C. sativa hybrids (Klinac et al., 1999). In Australia, orchards are also
expanding rapidly but mainly based on the introduction of C. sativa (Ridley, 1999).
In United States, new orchards are being established in California using seedlings
of Colossal (C. crenata) and present estimated area is 100 ha.
Chestnut production in Asia is twice that of Europe (this includes Turkey as
an European producer) (Table 2). The main species to produce nuts being C.
mollissima followed by C. sativa. Turkey and Italy are the main producers of
European chestnut, over 50,000 t each, followed by Portugal, France, Spain and
Greece.
2.2. Ecology
Chestnut, an Ancient Crop with Future 107
Chestnut is widespread in Europe, from Turkey to Portugal and Spain, the Azores
archipelago being the most Occidental point for C. sativa.
It is found at sea level in some areas of Northern Spain upto 1500 m in Granada
in Southern Spain, where the latitude could compensate for altitude (Pereira-Lorenzo
and Ramos-Cabrer, 2002). But the most frequent range for C. sativa in Spain is
between 400 m and 1000 m sea level (Table 3). In Southern France, orchards are
located lower than 500–600 m (Breisch, 1995).
In Spain, early leafing of hybrids (middle march) restricts its use due to spring
frosts in altitudes over 500 m, whereas C. sativa cultivars (middle April) could be
grown. Similarly, in the Mediterranean region, southerly-facing slopes should be
avoided. As the earlier blooming and the frequent spring frosts as well as dry summer
are all limiting factors. In Southern Galicia, south facing slopes were destined for