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A seamless beauty, glossy brown, plump and round. This is what the perfect chestnut looks like. A fruit that sustains an economy, especially in the villages of the Genal valley. Under normal circumstances the season closes with around three million kilos harvested in the province and the product, with its label 'made in Malaga', is exported all over Europe. Right now Diego Guerrero, as president of the chestnut cooperative for the Genal valley area in the Serranía de Ronda, admits that nothing is normal. This is the fifth year in a row that chestnut growers have had to deal with what he describes as a token crop. "It has once again been a disastrous year. If anything, we have been able to harvest 10% of a normal crop", he told SUR.
The reasons are to be found in a combination of various factors that together form an explosive cocktail: the ongoing drought, a fungus (gnomoniopsis) and the Asian chestnut gall wasp (Dryocosmus kuriphilus). In other words, the Malaga chestnut is currently succumbing to adverse weather and pests.
The situation is becoming more and more critical if one takes a look at what is happening with chestnuts in Malaga province. It is not a bad harvest that can be compensated for by the surpluses of the previous ones. For the Genal valley producers this is the fifth season without a harvest worth mentioning. The cooperative's president speaks of there only being enough chestnuts left for family consumption and to tempt people to visit these villages that are dotted throughout this so-called 'Copper Forest'. He adds that the worst thing of all is that no improvement can be expected in the short term. "Hopefully this is just a bad cycle. In Italy, they went through something similar and it lasted eight years."
However, this farmer no longer trusts the certainties of yesteryear and points to climate change. "If it becomes permanent, it will be very difficult for us to have a season like in the past." When Guerrero talks about climate change, he is referring to very long summers with at least two or three episodes of heat with temperatures reaching around 40 degrees and a lack of rain. This is exactly what has happened again. "It rained well in the spring and we were full of hope. Those hopes were then dashed by the summer," he states.
Neither has the difficult time that the Malaga chestnut is going through gone unnoticed by the agricultural associations. Asaja Malaga, the province's agricultural association of young farmers, issued a statement in which it speaks openly of a product that is "currently unprofitable." Their statement continues: "And this has socio-economic consequences, such as the depopulation of the land, where the lack of sufficient population and qualified labour for pruning, clearing and harvesting the fruit is alarming." In this context, it should also be pointed out that thousands of workdays have been lost because there is no fruit to harvest.
Asaja is also raising the alarm with the various governing bodies and is asking for financial aid for chestnut farmers. This would be the only way to avoid the economic ruin of an entire sector within the agriculture industry. Without the chestnut trees and the tourist attraction they provide annually, the economy of the Genal valley area would collapse.
Asaja Malaga's president, Baldomero Bellido, pulled up some figures to corroborate the existence of tough times ahead: "In Asaja's last agricultural assessment of December 2023, the province had 3,900 hectares of chestnut trees with a production of only 400 tonnes, compared to 1,500 tonnes the previous year. If this trend continues, chestnut cultivation could have a life expectancy of barely a decade in the province."
In addition to the fungus, drought and lack of rain, there is the added problem of the Asian chestnut gall wasp. Guerrero explained the effects of this pest on chestnut trees. "The insect lays its eggs in the buds of the chestnut trees and then the larvae develop inside these same buds. The chestnut tree itself grows more tissue to defend itself against infection. The chestnut tree ends up losing its ability to produce fruit," he explains. This vicious cycle of drought, insect and fungus is also passed on to the consumer in the shops and markets where they have to pay more for the product.
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