Industry News | Upcoming Events | Almond Board | Growing Almonds

Our Industry

Nestled between the Sierra Nevada mountains and the Pacific Coast Ranges is California's fertile Central Valley, home to one of the oldest and most beautiful flowering fruit trees. Unlike other flowering fruit trees that bear edible fruit, this tree's "pearl" is the delicious nut found inside the fruit, the almond.

California is the only place in North America where almonds are grown commercially. In the past 30 years, California's almond yield has quadrupled. More than 530,000 producing acres in the lush San Joaquin and Sacramento valleys are under almond cultivation, stretching 400 miles between Bakersfield and Red Bluff, California.

Almonds are California's largest tree nut crop in total dollar value and acreage. They rank as the largest U.S. Horticultural export. Approximately 6,000 almond growers produce 100 percent of the commercial domestic supply and more than 80 percent of worldwide production. Nearly 80 countries import California almonds. Overseas, Spain and Germany are the largest markets for almonds. Other major importers include the Netherlands, Japan, France, Italy, Canada, India, and China.

Direct Verifiable User (DV) Program
An industry initiative, the "Action Plan" calls for a rule change in the outgoing quality standards which include a mandatory pasteurization plan which was implementated on September 1, 2007. Within the plan, there is an exemption for the Direct Verifiable User (DV) program. Under this program, non-pasteurized almonds may be shipped by handlers directly to manufacturers in North America (U.S., Canada, Mexico) which qualify as DV Users.

Read more on the Direct Verifiable User (DV) program
The DV User Checklist can be viewed or downloaded here:
DV User Checklist

The Voluntary Aflatoxin Sampling Plan (For European Union)

The Voluntary Aflatoxin Sampling Plan can be viewed or downloaded here:
VASP