THE GLOBAL WINDOW OF TURKISH FOOD AND AGRICULTURE The Global Window of Turkish Food and Agriculture Sector
Related Articles
Press release…
Celal Kadooğlu, Chair of the Southeastern Anatolia Cereals, Pulses, Oil Seeds and Products Exporters’ Association, stated that the share of the Southeastern region was 66 percent in the two-month period when Türkiye’s total pasta exports were 144 million dollars.
Pointing out that it is a great chance for both Türkiye and the countries in the region that we have the world’s highest quality durum wheat and superior production infrastructure at competitive prices, Kadooğlu said, “As Southeastern Anatolia, we export half as much pasta as Italy in terms of quantity every year. We are constantly expanding our sphere of influence especially in the African market with our price performance quality. A significant portion of our pasta exports are realised to the members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which includes countries such as Ghana, Togo and Benin. As the scale of the population we reach by entering different markets grows, our exports are constantly surging in terms of quantity. We believe that Southeast’s pasta exports, which reached 162 thousand tonnes worldwide in the first 2 months, will exceed 1 million tonnes this year.”
“There is demand from Africa for all our product groups”
Highlighting that the strengthening of the commercial connections of food exporters in Africa has a positive effect on the income of other product groups as well as pasta, Kadooğlu explained, “In the first 2 months, approximately one third of Türkiye’s 508 million dollar worth of cereals, pulses and oilseeds exports to Africa was made from our region. In the sectoral trade of our region, countries with strategic positions on trade routes such as Djibouti, Ghana and Sudan stand out the most. Djibouti has an important place especially in our vegetable oil exports and Africa’s interest in this field is gradually turning towards the Southeast. Our Exporters’ Associations have made a lot of effort to improve our relations with the target countries and to make our exporters more knowledgeable for this market through different trainings. Now these efforts are paying off.”
“Our pulses production continues smoothly”
Underlining that the lowest February precipitation of the 2000s took place in the Southeast last month, Kadooğlu added, “The decrease exceeded 50 percent compared to seasonal norms. The productivity of the region, which hosts 16 percent of the wheat cultivation areas in our country, is of great importance in terms of year-end yields. Almost all of the red lentils in the country are produced in our region and there is no problem for the time being in this pulse, whose branching phase continues. Winter chickpea plantings are about to be completed. There is no problem that will affect our crop quality on the pulses side.”
