‘’Dalbasti cherry’’ is registered to Malatya and the second most important livelihood for the local community, after apricot. Dalbasti cherry is also demanded in abroad and exported to many countries like Germany, Norway and Russia.
Dogan Solmaz, the president of Yesilyurt Agriculture Chamber stated that dalbasti cherry’s geographical indication incorporated certificate was given to Malatya in 2017 and the cherry is demanded also in abroad due to it’s high quality.
He said: ‘’The cherry harvest started towards the end of May in Yesilyurt district and it ended towards the end of July. The price was 15 liras for a kilogram at the beginning of the harvest; yet this price decreased to 6 liras towards the end of the harvest.
This year’s harvest was of high quality thanks to appropriate weather conditions before and during the harvest. The quality brought the interest of the exporters; we exported nearly 630 tons of dalbasti cherry this year and Yesilyurt district gained nearly 4 million 500 thousand liras. Our cherry is finally getting the attention it deserves in abroad.’’
‘’We want to have an integrated plant.’’
Solmaz emphasized that Yesilyurt district has a great potential to export; yet, the integrated plants in the area remain insufficient. He continued:
‘’We expect our government to support us by funding integrated plant and cherry picking zones in our district in order for our cherry to be exported more, these are our requirements. We do not have a specified cherry picking zone in our district and it is estimated that there are 3 thousand 500 tons of cherry crops in Malatya. The dalbasti cherry’s price for a kilogram is a little bit higher than the other cherries in Malatya. If the producers sold a kilogram for 4.5-5 liras, the farmers would have a lot of money. The Malatya cherry is sent to many cities in domestic market such as Istanbul and Ankara. Cherry made Malatya gain nearly 18 million liras of income in total.’’
source: AA / translated by Bazaar Team