The Effect of Yield Fluctuations and Production Risk on Pistachio Commercial Cultivars in Kerman Province

The required capital and liquidity for agricultural production are always a limiting factor in Iranian agriculture. Since, income is a combination of production and product price, one of the major problems of the country's pistachio industry is the high yield fluctuations and high price fluctuations. In the present study, the mean and yield fluctuations of four pistachio commercial cultivars (Kaleh-Ghoochi, Ahmad-Aghaei, Akbari, and Owhadi) were evaluated in the Anar and Rafsanjan orchards in Kerman province. The information used in this study was collected through a questionnaire from farmers. The orchards were selected by multi-stage random method. From the total number of villages in the two regions, some sites were selected based on random. Then, some farmers were selected randomly. By referring to the selected farmers, an orchard was selected from each cultivar. The number of studied orchards was 100 forms in each cultivar. To measure the yield per hectare, the amount of actual product that had achieved in the last six years. Finally, the mean and yield fluctuations of 4 pistachio commercial cultivars were analyzed. The results showed that the studied cultivars had a significant difference in the yield, profit net and coefficient variation at a probability level of 5%. The results indicated that the Ahmad-Aghaei cultivar was the best in average yield (1758.7 kg ha-1) and net profit per hectare (292530201 Rials ha-1) and then Akbari cultivar. However, performance fluctuations in the Owhadi cultivar (53.06%) was lower than the other three cultivars. Base on the results, the Kaleh-Ghoochi cultivar was minimum in average yield (1073.6 kg ha-1) and production fluctuations (73.14%) than the others. Therefore, if the aim is to minimize the income fluctuations of pistachio farmers, depending on the region, one of Ahmad-Aghaei or Akbari cultivars should be planted. It can be concluded that among commercial cultivars, prioritization and justification for planting and propagation were Ahmad-Aghaei, Akbari, Owhadi and Kaleh-Ghoochi, respectively.