When Juan José Chacón decided to uproot his olive trees and leave cereal behind, few in Pozuelo de Calatrava imagined that this change would mark a before and after in his life. Today, this farmer from Ciudad Real walks among his 160 hectares of pistachios transformed into a million-dollar business.
“From 2010 to 2016 we have almost tripled capital,” he tells Research Team proud while showing the trees that changed his course. In six years he has gone from earning barely 40,000 euros a year to pocketing 650,000 euros, and with his sights set on the future he assures that “it can perfectly go to a million or two million euros.”
From olive to pistachio: “You can live like a marquis”
Although the Spanish olive contributes 67% of production at the European level, the pistachio is considered a highly profitable bet for many farmers like Ignacio, who, after having several olive crops for many years, decided to bet on the dried fruit.
“The pistachio can withstand the cold much more than the olive tree,” he explains, remembering the years when frost devastated his oil crops. He started by asking for a loan of 6,000 euros and, shortly after, he turned that risk into his best investment.
Due to his success, he now has nine vehicles in the family, most of them earned through the efforts of pistachio cultivation. Furthermore, he does not miss the opportunity to continue betting on it in continuous investments, convinced that he has found the goose that lays the golden eggs. And he is not afraid to joke: “A farmer who plants pistachio can live off of it and will live like a marquis.”
“In the countryside, there is no product that is equal in profitability”
Juan José’s phrase is not an exaggeration, it is the reality of a crop that has gone from being an alternative to becoming the main protagonist of the agricultural sector. The pistachio is now officially one of the most lucrative businesses in our agriculture. In 2024 alone, the planted area grew by 8.4%, exceeding 85,800 hectares.
The engine of this expansion is Castilla-La Mancha, which concentrates 75% of the national map, with Ciudad Real and Toledo at the head. Furthermore, Spain excels in sustainability: almost 39% of our pistachio trees are organic, one of the highest figures in all of Europe. And the numbers from the last campaign are impressive. In 2025, Castilla-La Mancha alone collected 11,000 tons, 30% more than expected, raising the national total to almost 18,000 tons.
Although we still bring pistachios from the US and Iran to cover demand, the sector has its sights set on the next decade: when the young plantations reach maturity, Spain will go from importing to being an exporting power. And it will do so with a luxury product: the Spanish pistachio is paid on average €8.86/kg, reaching €10/kg if it carries the organic seal.
This demand is not only a matter of the field, but also of habits. The rise of snacking healthy and the nutritional value of nuts have skyrocketed their global consumption. This pistachio fever is attracting new investors and forever changing the landscape of La Mancha. As Juan José says: “There is no product that is equal to the pistachio: neither in investment, nor in production, nor, of course, in profitability.”