“This year, the next year and the years ahead will be more advantageous for wheat. The producers will make a more profitable investment especially if they weight more in planting bread and durum wheat” Ahmet Güldal, the general manager of Turkish Grain Board (TMO), said.
Ahmet Güldal, the general manager of Turkish Grain Board (TMO), said that the wheat production has decreased a bit in recent years because farmers concentrated on alternative products. Talking about Turkey’s needs for wheat and the wheat’s role in export of flour and pasta, Güldal said that “Wheat, whose homeland is Anatolia, needs to be produced again around 21.5 million tons annually. For this, the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry has increased the premium and fertilizer support by 100 percent. As TMO, we especially emphasized this year’s purchase prices: if the farmer sows wheat, that farmer will have happy, satisfied, and profitable production. This year, next year, and coming next year will be more advantageous for wheat. The producers will make a more profitable investment especially if they weight more in planting bread and durum wheat.”
Saying that he tried to stress the importance of wheat within the agricultural production at every opportunity, Güldal said that Turkey’s wheat production needs to be around 21.5 million tons and the organization provides every support to achieve this objective.
Speaking at the 3rd Agriculture and Food Policy Conference organized by the Food, Beverage, Agriculture Policies Research Center (GIFT) and Adana Farmers Association, Güldal said that there has been increased production outside of wheat, adding that the wheat production has decreased by 9.5 percent and lowered to 19 million tons. This number has been lower than Turkey’s potential, and Güldal called on farmers to increase the wheat production. Saying that the board has increased the cereal prices by 21-33 percent, Güldal told that, “I would like to point out that there is no problem in our country this season due to the sale of products to TMO or the price set by TMO.”
NO IMPORTS DURING HARVEST PERIOD
During his talk, the general manager provided information on import and export. “As a country, we were net importers in chickpeas 2 years ago, and today we are net exporters. On the other hand, although we look importer in red lentils in terms of amount, we are net exporters in terms of value. The importance of our institution’s purchasing activities, as well as other operations we carry out for market stability, is obvious. Our company’s stocks are the insurance of market stability. In this context, in addition to our domestic purchases, we have reinforced our wheat and barley stocks through import at the right time and we will continue to do so. I would like to bring up a misunderstood subject. TMO does not have unlimited import authority. We carry out import whose amount is determined by the President and on renewable quality annually to use when needed. I would like to give this message clearly here. We, as TMO, do not import during the harvest period. We never bring up imports while harvesting continues. Our top priority is to prevent revenue loss of farmers.”
WE CARRY OUT IMPORT TO MEET COMMERCIAL NEED
Güldal stressed that farmers should be more sensitive on wheat and this product derives profit to Turkey from every angle. Güldal said that there have been statements on Turkey that the country is importer in wheat and increases wheat import. “Turkey’s annual needs are about 19 million tons of wheat. We also import 5-6 million tons. We do not import because of our needs, but for commerce. Yes, we do import, but the export of finished products increased very much. So, it would be wrong to say that Turkey imports for domestic consumption. This import is for export revenue. This will be very clear if you look at figures. Between 2002 and 2015, 54 million tons of wheat was imported for 15 billion dollars; when the wheat equivalent of finished products such as flour, pasta, bulgur, semolina and biscuits is calculated, we see a wheat export of 68 million tons worth 27 billion dollars. That means Turkey made USD 12 billion for this trade. The similar scenario is true for maize. Between 2002 and 2018, Turkey paid USD 7.7 billion for maize import. When we calculate the maize equivalent in the export of products such as eggs, white meat, starch, corn semolina, feed, we see an export income worth USD 12 billion. That means Turkey gained USD 4.3 billion since 2002. As you can see, there has been an increase in the finished product sector every year. We are the 1st in the world in flour export and the 2nd in pasta export. In the last 10 years, flour exports doubled, pasta exports increased by 6 times and eggs and white meat exports increased by 4 times.”