YARDIMLI (Azerbaijan): The Sultanate of Oman has given top priority to develop bilateral relations with Azerbaijan. This intent speeded up during United Nations’ climate change conference (COP29) that ended in the Azeri capital Baku recently.
Oman and Azerbaijan discussed prospects of cooperating in transport and green energy, on the sidelines of the conference. Reaffirming the growing bilateral ties, Oman’s Ambassador to Azerbaijan Saif Rashid al Jawari recently said, “We shall give particular attention to developing political, economic, trade and technical relations.”
These initiatives augur well for propelling Azerbaijan’s economy in GCC markets in the future. Under the initiative-taking leadership of President Ilham Aliyev, Azerbaijan’s economy gathers momentum on the highway of prosperity.
The salubrious and green Central Asian country, flanked by the Caspian Sea on the east and Talysh Mountains on the west, now aims to export its agricultural crops to the GCC and South Asia.
A European Union-supported agricultural project in Lankaran and Astara district added further speed to this goal. The project increased five times the yield of Yardimli district potato farmers in southern Azerbaijan. The ten-month phase two of the three-year project closed last month in Lankaran. The project, in partnership with Azerbaijan Government, boosted the productivity of farmers in Lankaran-Astara Economic Region.
The Head of Astara District Executive Authority Gazanfar Arif oglu Agayev, thanking the EU project team, said: “We appreciate your project work in Astara and other districts. We shall strive to increase the productivity of citrus crop, particularly mandarin. Last year the output was 52,000 tonnes. We now aim to reach 80,000 tonnes. We hope to repeat this success for avocado and peaches.”
The Azerbaijan Ministry of Economy and EU started the project titled ‘EU Support to Lankaran-Astara Economic Region of Azerbaijan’ in Lankaran in December 2021. Over three years, the EU team, led by Project Manager Tara Sharafudeen focused on helping and training Lankaran-Astara Economic Region farmers with international best practices.
“Our team helped Lankaran, Astara and six other districts farmers to modernise, boost crops quality and quantity by planting high-yield seeds delivered by the project and produce climate-change resistant fruits and vegetables. Our initiative helped to increase potato yield by five times,” said Tara.
This project supported Azerbaijan’s efforts to diversify and revive its economy affected during the Covid-19 pandemic, she said. “The EU project promoted a balanced and inclusive growth of Azerbaijan’s fruits and vegetables farms in Lankaran-Astara economic region and helped propelling their exports.”
On November 22, the EU project launched Deman Mountain Potato brand at an event led by Tara and held in Yardimli to honour farmers who increased their yield using the project’s best farming practices.
“We wanted to develop new markets, particularly in the GCC and South Asia, and increase exports of Azerbaijan farmer. Therefore, we developed the Deman Mountain Potato brand,” said Tara.
Explaining details, the EU project’s horticulture expert Masum Burak said, “We did value-chain studies in six districts. We planned solutions after finding the problems. We set up 44 Demonstration Plots in five districts and trained farmers with international best practices to increase their agricultural output.
“We selected one fruit, either mandarin, strawberry, lemon, or vegetable, for demo plots in each district. We developed eight demo plots for potato in Yardimli and Lerik districts. We trained farmers using interpreters who explained cultivation nuances in Azerbaijani language. The EU project was successful because more than a dozen farmers owning fields from two to ten hectares cooperated with us.”
The project increased the potato yield using different varieties such as Vaqif, Seyinch, Orkestr and Kolomba. One Yardimli farmer, Iskender Isayev, topped the output chart in the region, using the project’s international best practices.
The EU project’s success in southern Azerbaijan opens prospects of exporting fruits and vegetables to the GCC for farmers here. For starters, the farmers, exporters, and logistics companies in Azerbaijan could focus on Oman.
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