A Predicted Record Harvest Would Make Turkey the World’s Second-Largest Olive Oil Producer

In Turkey, ini­tial esti­mates for the cur­rent crop year sug­gested a higher yield of olive oil than the 228,000 tons pro­duced in 2021/22.

However, the offi­cial yield fore­cast released last week exceeded expec­ta­tions, pro­ject­ing the country’s olive oil crop to exceed 400,000 tons this year, a record high. Official pro­vi­sional fig­ures for table olives also indi­cate a record har­vest of more than 700,000 tons in Turkey.

“It is esti­mated that total table olive pro­duc­tion will be 735,678 tons, an increase of 45 per­cent com­pared to the 2021/22 sea­son,” Mustafa Tan, the chair­man of the board of the Turkish national olive and olive oil coun­cil which coor­di­nated the fore­cast stud­ies, told Olive Oil Times.

“A total of 421,717 tons of olive oil will be obtained with an increase of 79 per­cent com­pared to the 2021/22 sea­son,” he added.

Tan attrib­uted the country’s expected record olive oil and table olive yields to the advan­ta­geous weather con­di­tions pre­vail­ing in Turkey and the pur­pose­ful cam­paign to advance the coun­try’s olive oil pro­duc­tion poten­tial.

“We have the most favor­able cli­matic con­di­tions and, there­fore, [the olive trees] were rel­a­tively lit­tle affected by cli­mate change,” he said. ​“We set the goal of rank­ing sec­ond in the world in 2007. To achieve this goal, with incen­tives from our Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, the num­ber of fruit-bear­ing and non-fruit-bear­ing trees has increased from 100 to 120 mil­lion to 168 to 196 mil­lion.”

Due to its geo­graph­i­cal loca­tion between Europe and Asia on the north­east­ern side of the Mediterranean basin, Turkey avoided the unfa­vor­able dry and hot weather that affected large parts of west­ern and south­ern Europe in the sum­mer.

The region’s worst drought in the past 500 years has par­tially resulted in abnor­mally low yields across most of Europe’s olive oil-pro­duc­ing nations.

Tan also indi­cated that Turkish pro­duc­ers and exporters might be able to fill the gap in inter­na­tional mar­kets.

“This record level of our yield shows that we can cre­ate a very impor­tant oppor­tu­nity, espe­cially in terms of our for­eign trade,” he said. ​“We believe that Turkey will be able to meet a sig­nif­i­cant amount of the sup­ply short­ages expe­ri­enced in other coun­tries. We can get out of this global cri­sis together.”

Tan added the vast olive oil and table olives har­vest pro­jected for Turkey could fur­ther fuel domes­tic con­sump­tion.

“Such a full crop year could lead to a sig­nif­i­cant increase in domes­tic con­sump­tion of olive oil and table olives in Turkey,” he said. ​“In par­tic­u­lar, a sig­nif­i­cant por­tion of the for­eign cur­rency loss due to the short­ages and imports of oils such as sun­flower oil can be met with olive oil, cre­at­ing added value both domes­ti­cally and inter­na­tion­ally and con­tribut­ing to our coun­try’s econ­omy.”

The pro­jec­tions of a bumper olive har­vest in Turkey are being reflected in the words of pro­duc­ers from across the coun­try.

“Turkey will have a new record for olive oil quan­tity this year,” Cem Erdilek, the gen­eral man­ager of Darvari Gida Tarim, an award-win­ning pro­ducer from the Geyliki region near the Dardanelles Strait in north­west Turkey, told Olive Oil Times.

“In all regions of Turkey, the [olive] trees are full of fruits, as we hear from our friends and from the peo­ple who are into the olive and olive oil busi­ness,” he added. ​“Our har­vest will end around the mid­dle of November, and we are sure that we will dou­ble our quan­tity of olive oil com­pared to last year.”

However, Erdilek expressed some reser­va­tions about whether olive oil prices at ori­gin will be favor­able for pro­duc­ers through­out the crop year. He also iden­ti­fied ris­ing pro­duc­tion costs as a sig­nif­i­cant bur­den for pro­duc­ers to shoul­der.

“Harvesting labor costs have dou­bled this year, and all other related costs are also too high,” he said. ​“To pro­tect our­selves against infla­tion, we are invest­ing in har­vest­ing tools and equip­ment to decrease the cost of har­vest.”

Meanwhile, the country’s first state-licensed ware­house for stor­ing olive oil and table olives is planned to be built in the dis­trict of Akhisar in Manisa province, often referred to as the cen­ter of Turkey’s olive oil indus­try.

The ware­house, dubbed ​‘the miss­ing link’ of the Turkish domes­tic olive oil sup­ply chain,
is expected to pro­vide local pro­duc­ers with the abil­ity to safely store their oils until the mar­ket con­di­tions are right to sell and receive higher rev­enue.

“We are break­ing new ground in Turkey and for our olive and olive oil pro­duc­ers,” said Besim Dutlulu, the mayor of Akhisar. ​“We bring a total of 6,500 tons of licensed ware­houses to our city. In this way, our pro­duc­ers will return to the land, and our city will become the cen­ter of table olives and olive oil as it deserves.”

• Cumhuriyet