Sexagenarian trader Haji Qutubuddin’s heart was heavy as he worked in his dusty Zhob godown on an autumn morning in 2025.
Around him lay sacks of freshly harvested pine nuts from the Koh-i-Sulaiman Range — a crop that sustains thousands of families across northern Balochistan. But unlike previous seasons, traders and forest owners gathering outside were not celebrating the harvest. The price of pine nuts — locally known as chilghoza — had collapsed, threatening the livelihoods of communities that depend almost entirely on the crop.
Qutubuddin, a trader for four decades, attributes multiple factors to this price collapse — disruption in exports, decline in rainfall in the area and a lack of cold storage facilities in the town. “We were forced to sell our produce prematurely at low prices,” he tells Eos. “Poor storage adversely impact the nuts’ size, taste and quality.”
Pakistan’s growing chilghoza trade generates millions of dollars annually. Yet on the slopes of the world’s largest pure pine forest in Balochistan’s Sulaiman Range, the people who depend on the trade for survival are facing their toughest season in years…
PRICES IN FREEFALL
Mehmood Khan Kharoti, a trader with a decade of experience, says pine nut prices plummeted to Rs2,000 per kilogramme (kg) in 2025 from Rs7,000 a season earlier. “If we had a storage facility in town, one kg could easily have been sold in Lahore for 7,000 to 8,000 rupees,” he tells Eos.
It is equally bad for growers, says Faizullah Khan, who lives on the foothills of the Sulaiman Range. “I used to sell around 4,000 kilos of chilghoza, but this year I managed to sell only 1,200 kilos,” he tells Eos.
The intermittent closure of the Afghan border also reduced the demand for pine nuts, driving down prices further. Trader Abdul Qayyum, who moved his business to Zhob after the border closure, tells Eos that he has been selling nuts at half the price from last year.
A bumper crop in South Waziristan — a separate and better-performing region that is home to almost 100,000 hectares of pine forests — has also affected prices. Traders from Waziristan say that prices have gone down from Rs10,000 per kg in 2024 to Rs3,000 per kg in 2025.
FORESTS UNDER PRESSURE
The vast mountainous belt of the Sulaiman Range is home to extensive pine nut forests. The pine cones are harvested in September and October, and brought down to the Zhob market. The shelled nuts are extracted from the cones and then transported, mostly to Lahore, for export.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the Sulaiman Range is home to the world’s largest pure pine forests, occupying an area of approximately 26,000 hectares. But an FAO survey conducted in late 2023 documented a staggering decline in pine nut production from the Sulaiman Range. Output plummeted to merely 98 tonnes, a sharp fall from the 675 tonnes recorded in 2020.
The survey was conducted after the catastrophic wildfires of 2022 in Sherani, Musakhel, and Dera Ismail Khan forests destroyed an estimated 3.2 million mature, fruit-bearing pine trees, severely eroding the region’s ecological stability and economic resilience.
Yet even as production in the Sulaiman Range collapsed, Pakistan’s overall pine nut exports continued to rise, reflecting stronger harvests elsewhere and sustained demand from overseas buyers.
The majority of Pakistan’s pine nuts export is destined for China, the world’s largest producer and consumer of pine nuts. According to state data from China, Pakistan’s pine nut exports nearly doubled from 579.8 tonnes in 2023 to 1,147 tonnes in 2025. However, export earnings — which rose from $8.2 million to a peak of $18.8 million in 2024 — stood at $17.9 million in 2025.
While export volumes increased, traders say the benefits were unevenly distributed and failed to offset the sharp decline in domestic prices caused by oversupply and market disruptions.
MARKET BOTTLENECKS
Traders and forest owners argue that the sector suffers from a chronic lack of institutional support.
Unlike other export-oriented agricultural products, pine nuts pass through a fragmented supply chain with limited storage, processing and quality-control facilities. As a result, producers often sell immediately after harvest, when supply is highest and prices are weakest. Industry stakeholders say that improving post-harvest handling and strengthening direct links with buyers could help stabilise incomes and improve export competitiveness.
Abdul Haleem Nangyal, a research officer in the provincial agriculture department, says that limited market access and lack of value addition are also challenges, while limited language skills prevent local traders from connecting to national and international buyers. He adds that climate-induced changes in weather, particularly rainfall, and lack of storage spaces for the sensitive and perishable product are also challenges, “as they reduce the quality and size of the pine nuts, thus deterring buyers.”
An FAO official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, alleges that certain traders would mix premium-quality Afghan pine nuts — which have Geographical Indication (GI) certification — with local nuts of lower quality before exporting them as premium quality nuts to China.
A GI certification serves as an intellectual property right that prevents unauthorised competitors from imitating the product or misleading consumers. “This ‘adulteration’ prompted Chinese authorities to temporarily halt nut imports from Pakistan,” the official tells Eos. He adds that, with FAO’s technical assistance, Pakistan’s GI registration process for pine nuts is now at its final stages.
Growers and traders deny the allegation, instead accusing police and customs officials of systematic harassment. “In Lahore, Rawalpindi and several other cities, official teams stop trucks without reason, re-check documents unnecessarily and pressurise traders,” alleges trader Khayal Gul.
LIFE AMONG THE PINES
Despite supplying a high-value export crop that reaches markets in China and the Gulf, many settlements in the highlands remain disconnected from basic services. Residents say access to healthcare, education and clean drinking water is limited, while poor roads and rugged terrain make travel difficult for much of the year. For many families, the annual pine nut harvest remains the only significant source of cash income.
The pine forests of the Sulaiman Range are traditionally owned by the Sherani tribe, whose communities live across both Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Pine nuts are harvested manually from steep mountain slopes, with workers climbing tall trees and removing still-green cones using hooked poles. The work is dangerous.
“Harvesters fall from trees every season,” says Abdul Wadood, a harvester from the area. “Many are injured and some lose their lives.”
A FRAGILE FUTURE
For growers and traders, the immediate need is not higher yields but better market access. Many argue that investments in cold storage, transport infrastructure and transparent export channels would help stabilise prices and reduce post-harvest losses.
Experts say protecting the forests themselves is equally important. The devastating wildfires of 2022 exposed the vulnerability of one of the world’s largest pine forest ecosystems, making conservation inseparable from economic survival.
Nangyal, the research officer, believes that the establishment of a research institute in the town would help identify and resolve yield-related issues in a suitable manner. Without such interventions, communities that depend on pine forests fear that both their livelihoods and the forests themselves will continue to decline.
Back in his Zhob godown, Qutubuddin was worried less about export statistics than the next harvest season. Around him, sacks of pine nuts awaited buyers in an increasingly uncertain market.
Unless prices recover and long-standing bottlenecks are addressed, he fears many families who depend on the forests of the Sulaiman Range may not be able to withstand another season like the one last year.
The writer is a Balochistan-based journalist.
He may be contacted at mandokhail.rafi@gmail.com.
X: @Rafi_Mandokhail
With editing and input from Hussain Dada. X: @hydada83
Published in Dawn, EOS, June 21st, 2026