California walnuts are famous all over the world and have a great history. Charles Leslie from the University of California talked about them at the Walnut Technical Days.
"Walnut cultivation in California grew from 250 thousand to 400 thousand acres between 2008 and 2018. Production in 2019 is expected to reach 600 thousand tons."
The US represent 49% of the global production and 67% of the world trade. Other exporter countries are Chile with 14%, Ukraine, China and Romania. There are 4,800 walnut growers in California and 95 processors.
"66% of the produce is exported and the domestic industry employs 85,000 people. Nonetheless, we want to improve our performances and invest more in marketing. We need to stimulate demand and market promotion to increase profit opportunities. We will focus on marketing activities and research the health aspects and production to supply healthy high-quality products."
In order to push consumption, "more emphasis will be placed on health aspects but an emotional connection will also be established with consumers through cooking and recipes."