Aromatic and medicinal plants large yields and reduced production costs

Damascus-SANA

Syria enjoys a suitable climate for the growth of medicinal and aromatic plants, which is characterized by its richness in active substances, including wild and cultivated within farmers’ lands, which contributes to securing additional income for farmers at reduced production costs and supports the national economy by exporting products to a large number of countries.

Engineer Ahmed Hamidi, head of the Field Crops Department in the Plant Production Directorate at the Ministry of Agriculture, indicated that the planned area for implementation for the current season amounted to 61,040 hectares and implemented 58,748 hectares, with an implementation rate of 96 percent, noting that the group of medicinal and aromatic plants consists of cumin, anise, nigella, coriander, thyme, fenugreek and fennel. Basic in Aleppo governorate with 25272 hectares, Hasaka governorate 20950 hectares, Idlib governorate 4785 hectares, Hama governorate 3022 hectares, Homs governorate 2393 hectares and Al-Ghab governorate 2070 hectares.

Hamidi suggested the establishment of transformative factories for aromatic and medicinal plants crops to benefit from the added value by exporting them packaged or in the form of medicinal and aromatic preparations in addition to their nutritional value, indicating that these items receive the necessary attention from the ministry by expanding the cultivated areas and communicating with the concerned authorities to indicate the volume of production to enter into Manufacturing, packaging and packaging operations, exporting the surplus and providing facilities and technical support to farmers to expand these crops in the future, which have witnessed a remarkable increase in the past years due to the high prices in the local and foreign market and the possibility of cultivating them effectively and the low costs of production and service.

Dr. Jalal Fandy, a specialist in medicinal plants and the environment and a member of the teaching staff at the Faculty of Pharmacy at Damascus University, indicated in a similar statement the importance of developing the medicinal herbal products industry to become a supporter of the national economy and providing facilities for the Syrian product that seeks to export these vital products to global markets, pointing out that the increase in the number of establishments that invest In medicinal plants, they need support through the development of ways to provide Syrian herbal products in multiple pharmaceutical forms, which contributes to improving the economic returns for farmers interested in growing medicinal plants.

Al-Khatib said: A number of trainings were conducted in the countryside of Tartous, Lattakia and Aleppo on methods of preparing aloe vera extract, methods of cultivating correct medicinal plants and methods of preparing manual soap from olive oil and laurel, indicating that there are many errors in eating medicinal herbs such as relying on unreliable sources such as social media to obtain Information about using these herbs without consulting specialists or resorting to them to treat a disease and stop using medicines.

In turn, a number of farmers in Hama, Hasaka and Homs, including Jassim Al-Mustafa, Salem Al-Salem and Saleh Al-Abdullah, indicated that they constantly grow medicinal and aromatic crops because they are of high economic feasibility, in addition to the fact that the ease of discharging them in the local market is well done, but they suffer from not being allocated the fuel oil needed for irrigation from Before the directorates of agriculture, like other crops, despite the urgent need of citizens.

Amjad Sabbagh

SANA Economic Bulletin

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