Spain: Growing cultivation of peanut pumpkins

The popularity of this type of pumpkin is on the rise, both in Spain and in other countries. Norway, Sweden, Finland, France and the UK are its main consumers and importers; this is the reason the cultivation of this vegetable has been growing in recent years.

"We started planting it because we had an English client that asked us for it," explains Arturo Fernández, manager of Cortijo Las Palomas, Seville. Consequently, this company has gone from devoting about two hectares, with a production of 40,000 kilos per year, to producing 500,000 kilos, and with potential to continue growing. "We are not excluding other varieties, we are just focusing on the ones that our customers are demanding," states Fernández.

Regarding prices, "last year they were low; a kilo stood below 1 Euro, and we believe that there won't be any major changes this year, as everything so far has developed in the same way as last season," explains Fernández.

Today, this southern Spanish company claims to have two advantages over other producers. "In this typical Mediterranean climate, which is ideal for this vegetable, we have carefully chosen an early variety to make sure that we are among the first to harvest it," affirms Fernández, "and we have a good long-term storage capacity thanks to a system of air renewal and temperature control," added the representative of Cortijo Las Palomas.