Wheat yields in Turkey could decline by as much as 20 percent this year over 2013 due to unfavourable weather conditions that have hurt crops, a fact that will also mean price hikes for wheat products, a Turkish agriculture union warned over the weekend.

Agriculturalists’ Association of Turkey (TZD) President İbrahim Yetkin said on Saturday in Ankara that the country may suffer serious losses in its wheat harvest this year due to the spread of a plant disease. A viral disease that emerged after recent heavy rains threatens to lead to a serious decline in wheat production across Turkey, which will eventually bring about a price increase in wheat products, the TZD head asserted. Yetkin said farmers are seeing the spread of a plant virus known as PAS following the heavy rains over the past week that flooded wheat farms in numerous provinces. Yetkin said the disease has heavily damaged the crops before they could be harvested. “We could have minimized the damage had the farmers applied pesticide to crops. … I assume most farmers skipped this process because they could not afford the chemicals used for protecting crops,” Yetkin explained.

Turkey was already suffering declines in wheat crop yields due to a lack of rainfall through the autumn and winter seasons. Seeds could not germinate in some places. Following the drought, heavy rainfall also led to crop rot before crops could be gathered. The TZD head predicted that Turkey could see its wheat production decline by as much as 20 percent this year over 2013, given such problems. One of Europe’s largest wheat producers, Turkey harvested a record 22.1 million tons in 2013, according to the Turkish Statistics Institute (TurkStat). The TZD estimates the bad weather conditions will pull the wheat crop yield down to below 18 million tons in 2014.

“This will be a tough year for Turkish agriculture; we could see a rise in food inflation. … The prices of produce and bread in the markets will see hikes in the coming weeks,” Yetkin added. He suggested that Turkey might need to import wheat to meet demand at home this year.

 

 

 

 

 

Source Zaman

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