The harvest of the fully organically grown olives in Mardin’s Derik district has been completed. The producers started the process of converting the olives they collected into olive oil. Erkan Doğan, Chairperson of Mardin Olive Producers’ Union, stated that there is a fertile season in the olive harvest and said, “Our producers bring their olives and make olive oil this year. This year’s harvest is very good. We produce 20 tons of olive oil per day.”
Apart from the most preferred table olive Halhali variety in Derik district, which is estimated to date back to one thousand year ago in terms of both palatal delight and oil quality, the harvest has completed through 220 thousand trees in 11 thousand 370 decares with its zoncuk, gulek, kejik, ğurseki, belloti, blue, crypt, melkebazi and melebeli varieties.
Producers have started the process of converting some of the olives they harvested into olive oil this year. The fact that olives collected in the gardens are converted into olive oil in the facility established in the district 3 years ago has increased the profits of the producers. Olive as the symbol of the district, which is the main source of livelihood of people of the district and also received various awards in the international arena, furthermore the fertility of olives this year made the producers happy.
Indicating that olives have had a fertile year, Erkan Doğan noted, “Our producers bring their olives and make olive oil this year. This year’s harvest has delighted our producers. 500 tons of olives per year are converted into olive oil. The daily production amount at the facility in the district is 20 tons.”
Faruk Temelli, Head of Derik District Chamber of Agriculture, explained that 7,500 tons of olives were obtained throughout the district this year and added, “We can not meet demands because of our olive oil’s high quality. Actually the history of our olives is not known since it goes back to very old times. We are planning to hand out 50 thousand olive saplings to our farmers this year.”