"The King of the fall " is coming from Macedonia and China – How do Serbian companies procure chestnut and is there domestic producers?

These are the countries Serbia imports chestnut from and Albania, Italy and Greece follow. Domestic chestnut almost does not exist.

Whoever collects it does it forhimself. eKapija explored whether chestnut is purchased in an organized way somewherein Serbia but we did not find data.

According to the data of the and three in the Belgrade region.

Chestnut is one of the first productsa man has ever eaten, experts say. Today, one can make a rich product line offood products from a chestnut. Chestnut can be dried thus making flour forbakery products and cakes. Since it does not contain gluten, it is ideal forthe sick suffering coeliac disease. Apiaristsappreciate chestnut as a highly productive honey plant. Chestnut baking in thestreets dates from the period of the old Rome and it still lives in many worldcities as well as in Belgrade.

Candy shops and food companies use chestnut the most in Serbia. They eitherimport it as raw material or semi-product.

One of the biggest confectionaries, Subotica-based Pionir, procures it inHungary.

- We import 15 tons of powder chestnut per year. We used to procure it inSubotica-based copany which was privatized in the meantime and which delistedthis product - Branimir Kopilovic from Pionir says for eKapija.

It seems that at this moment organizedproduction in Serbia does not exist. The Ministry of trade or similar expert institutionssuch as the Institute for fruit growing in Cacak and at the Agriculture Facultyin Novi Sad either do not have that kind of data to provide us with.

Vladislav Ognjanov, professor at the fruit growing department in Novi Sad saysthat wholesale chestnut growing in Serbia is not impossible for the moment butis very hard to carry out.

As our collocutor says, Serbia has nurseries which sell chestnut seeds but theyare mainly produced from the seed not convenient for a real production.

- The second limiting factor forSerbia is that chestnut can be successfully grown only in acid land which isavailable in Zajecar region and Sumadija. Kosmet has most of it – a collocutor ofeKapija adds.

It is impossible to start organized growing but it is necessary that the statesupports it through import of quality seeds from abroad, professor Ognjanovsays.

Chestnut "from a park" is not edible

It is important to know that chestnut and wild chestnut are not the same.Chestnut (in Latin - castanea stativa) is edible and healthy and wild one (aesculushippocastanum) is not.

Although it is not edible, wildchestnut has numerous healing features so creams, extracts, shampoos, etc. aremade from it.

M.S.