THE GLOBAL WINDOW OF TURKISH FOOD AND AGRICULTURE The Global Window of Turkish Food and Agriculture Sector
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Press release…
Turkey is gearing up for a bountiful season for peaches and nectarines. The first harvest ceremony of the season for peaches and nectarines took place in the Selçuk district of İzmir province. Over a four-month period in 2026, exports of peaches and nectarines rose by 347 percent to 90 million dollars. The target for peach and nectarine exports has been set at 250 million dollars.
The “Peach Harvest Ceremony” was attended by Kahraman Akdoğan, Director of the İzmir Provincial Directorate of Agriculture and Forestry; Oğuz Alp Çağlar, District Governor of Selçuk; Mustafa Acargil, District Director of Agriculture and Forestry in Selçuk; Cengiz Balık, Chair of the Aegean Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Exporters’ Association; Hayrettin Uçak, Chair of the Sectoral Council of the Turkish Fruit and Vegetable Products Exporters’ Associations; İzmir Chamber of Agriculture Chairperson İbrahim Erdallı and members of the Board of Directors of the Aegean Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Exporters’ Association—Sadık Demircan, Tolga Selim Kağan and Muhammet Elçiboğa—as well as Audit Committee Member Recep Çöpten.
Cengiz Balık, Chair of the Aegean Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Exporters’ Association, noted that Türkiye ranks third in the world for peach and nectarine production, emphasising that production, which stood at 455,000 tonnes in 2002, had risen by 159 percent over 22 years to reach 1,180,000 tonnes.
Sharing that peach and nectarine production had fallen to 642,000 tonnes in 2025 due to the climate crisis, Balık said, “We expect the peach and nectarine harvest to exceed 1 million tonnes in 2026. In 2024, we were the world’s second-largest exporter of peaches and nectarines, with exports worth 255 million dollars.”
“In line with the decline in the harvest that year, this figure fell to 160 million dollars. With the spike in the harvest in 2026, we aim to return to the 250 million dollar range in exports,” he added…
