Follow the Pistachios: How Iran's Own Seeds Built a $9 Billion US Industry — Then Got Sanctioned Out of the Market
Every pistachio you crack open in America traces its lineage to Iran. Specifically, to the province of Kerman — where a USDA "plant explorer" named William E. Whitehouse spent a year in the late 1920s collecting samples. One female cultivar showed promise. He named it "Kerman." It became the cornerstone of America's entire commercial pistachio industry. Today, that industry is worth over $9
billion. Iran — the country that gave America the very seeds — has been sanctioned out of global pistachio markets for four decades. The Gift That Kept on Taking Iran was the world's largest pistachio exporter for centuries. But after the 1979 revolution toppled the US-backed Shah — the same Shah whose government had facilitated agricultural exchanges with American researchers — Washington imposed
sweeping sanctions. Iranian pistachios were locked out of the US market overnight. The American pistachio industry saw its opening. With its biggest competitor legally barred from the market, US production exploded. From virtually nothing in the 1970s, America now produces nearly twice what Iran does. The Wonderful Monopoly The biggest beneficiary? The Wonderful Company, owned by Beverly Hills
billionaires Stewart and Lynda Resnick. Their pistachio empire controls the vast majority of US production. Their gimmicky Super Bowl ads with celebrity endorsements turned American pistachios into a snack food phenomenon. But the Resnicks' business model has a geopolitical dependency: Iran must stay sanctioned. If Iranian pistachios — which many consider superior in flavor and variety — returned