The 1940s – the war

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Detroyer Ydra D-97 22/04/1941 (7 miles from the port of Aegina)
The war years saw great poverty and misery in Aegina. It has been calculated that the percentage of deaths from hunger in Aegina during the German Occupation was the highest in the whole of Greece.

Those who worked the land grew staple plants such as the potato. It seems unlikely that pistachio cultivation spread at all during this period, although those who produced pistachios could exchange them for other foods, or supplement their meagre diet.

In 1950, according to data from the National Statistical Service, the cultivation of pistachios covered 1,050 stremmata. It is believed that most of that land was planted after the end of the war.