Konya Plain became the most important production region in Turkey for sunflower production. Harvest started in an area of 640,000 decares where sunflower was planted early in the region.
Konya, Turkey's granary, has about 47% of its 38,873 square kilometers of land used for agriculture. Konya contributes significantly to the national economy with its production of about 6 million tons of grain.
Burak Kırkgöz, President of the Chamber of Agricultural Engineers (ZMO) Konya Branch, said, "The April rains had an impact on sunflowers as well as other green crops. The good April rains caused the sunflower plant to emerge faster. This was very important when we consider that there is a large area of sunflower cultivation in the Konya region. We hope that our yield will be good this year due to the rains. Our farmers have provided the necessary maintenance, irrigation, and fertilizers in the period they need."
Burak Kırkgöz, said that they expect a bountiful season in the plain. He said, "There was a slight decline in sunflower cultivation areas this year. We had a cultivation area of 675,000 decares in Konya last year, but this year we have an area of approximately 640,000 decares. Of course, one of the biggest factors in this is that the sunflower prices were a bit low last year, which led our farmers to turn to other crops instead of sunflowers. Our yields are coming out well this year. The first harvested fields are not very productive, but even in our first harvested fields, our yields are good. We hope that there will be no loss in our yield despite the decline in cultivation area."
