Homs- Sana
The Homs Agriculture Directorate estimated apple production for the current season at about 125 thousand tons, while a number of village farmers in the western countryside of the governorate demanded to provide electrical power to the areas where there are storage facilities to preserve the crop and market it later at reasonable prices.
Fouad Mahfoud, an apple farmer from the village of Hazor, explained in a statement to SANA reporter that the estimated production of apples for this year in the areas of the villages of Jabal al-Helou and al-Wadi is about 100,000 tons, while the number of operating apple storage refrigerators is about 300 refrigerators, with a capacity of approximately 3 million boxes, which is equivalent to 60,000 tons. Out of the full production and this constitutes more than 60 percent of the production.
Regarding the current situation, a number of storage refrigerator owners confirmed that the current electrical feeding situation does not serve the possibility of operating the refrigerators, which will negatively affect the marketing prices of the apple crop and lead to great losses for farmers.
For his part, Yasser Muhammad Mukhtar of the village of “Batisa al-Jard” stated that the reality of apple production this season is similar to last year’s season in terms of production and electricity status. The issue was remedied in coordination between the governorates of Homs and Tartous by setting the rationing period of three hours, compared to three hours cut off from the 15th of September Until the 15th of December, which is the critical period for storing apples according to the required conditions, pointing to the need to expedite the implementation of the rationing program, which provides a marketing margin for farmers according to the best prices.
The director of Homs Agriculture, Younis Hamdan, said in a statement to SANA that the governorate’s production of apples for the current agricultural season is estimated at 125 thousand tons, as the largest area of apples is cultivated with rainfed crops at 68,797 dunums out of the total area of 112364 dunums, while the total number of trees is about 4.4 million. Trees, including 3.7 million fruitful trees, indicating that apple cultivation spreads over large areas of the governorate’s countryside, especially the villages of the western countryside, in addition to some villages in the Qusair countryside, southwest of Homs.
For his part, Muhammad Omran, director of the Syrian branch of trade in Homs, confirmed in a similar statement that committees were formed with the Directorate of Agriculture and the Peasants’ Union in order to market the crop from farmers.
Suleiman Ezz El-Din, head of the Homs Farmers Union, called for the need to expedite the marketing of the entire apple crop from farmers at acceptable prices, indicating that they are constantly demanding support for the marketing process and positive intervention to protect farmers from the greed of traders and brokers, in order to achieve a financial return commensurate with the costs of agriculture.
During the last season, the production of chickpeas from apples amounted to about 92 thousand tons.
Saba Khairbek
SANA Economic Bulletin
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