Türkiye Produces 1.6 Million Tons of Organic Food Annually

Turkey Produces 1.6 Million Tons of Organic Food Annually Stating that Turkey's annual organic food production reaches 1.6 million tons, Ege İhracatçı Birlikleri Coordinator Chairman Jak Eskinazi expressed their goal of capturing 1 percent of the organic sector, which has reached a global market size of EUR 121 billion.

We aim to rank among the top 3 countries importing into the European Union

Sharing information that 49,000 farmers in Turkey produce 267 types and 1.6 million tons of organic products across 352,000 hectares, EİB Coordinator Chairman Jak Eskinazi said, "The areas allocated to organic production in Turkey are above the global average at 1.7 percent. We rank 3rd in the EU and 12th globally in the number of organic producers. The Aegean Region is the leading region in organic production and exports. 75 percent of Turkey's organic product exports are conducted from the Aegean Region. We rank 7th among the countries from which the European Union, which imports nearly 3 million tons of organic products annually, makes the most purchases. Our goal is to enter the top three on this list," he concluded.

"We aligned with the EU Green Deal 35 years ago"

Ege İhracatçı Birlikleri Organic Products and Sustainability Coordinator and Ege Dried Fruit and Products Exporters Association Chairman Mehmet Ali Işık, noting that the European Union brought the European Green Deal to the world's agenda in 2019, laying the foundations for a greener and more livable world against the climate crisis, drew attention to the fact that the Turkish organic sector is a sector that has aligned with the European Green Deal targets.

As the organic sector, we target USD 1 billion in exports

Chairman Işık, noting that "Turkey also has approximately 35 years of experience in the organic sector," continued as follows: "With this experience, we should serve as an example to our other sectors in their fight against the climate crisis, and we need to take a strong position at BioFach Fair and similar organizations to achieve Turkey's carbon-neutral targets by 2050. To maintain our position in the EU, our largest export market, to conduct sustainable and environmentally friendly production, and to say stop to the global climate crisis, we must establish and implement a humane ecosystem across all our sectors. As Ege İhracatçı Birlikleri, taking steps related to sustainability is among the priority items of our strategic plan. German Agriculture Minister Cem Özdemir clearly communicated to the global public that Germany and the European Union decided to increase organic production by 30 percent after the pandemic. Our priority will be to ensure sustainability in healthy food production while protecting our soils. It is essential to protect our soils to increase organic production. Through our UR-GE and R&D projects, we will focus on this issue. Universities, research institutes, and producers will be our stakeholders in this regard. We believe that through this, we will increase our organic product exports, which are currently at the USD 500 million level, to USD 1 billion."