Syria, one of the most important countries for table olives and olive oil of the wordl is also in harvesting

Syria and table olives production

 

The most important syrian varieties processed in the facilities of Aleppo, Idleb and Damascus are: Sorani, Jlot, Kaissy,Zayty and Nabali, and someone less important at Palmyra surroundings.



Foto: Distribution of production olives for some syrian factories (GCSAR (Syria) + CRB (Italy) report)

The quantitative distribution of the 3 most significant olives cultivars in Syria are the following: green Kaissy (53%), black Sorany (23%) and green Sorany (15%).

These olives are processed for 3 main styles:



·         Processed green olives (debittering by soda solutions or Spanish style)

·         Natural green olives (Greek styles)

·         Natural black olives.

Olives are packed and commercialized as whole, pitted, stuffed as well as sliced, halves…

Spanish olives style seems to be applied only to Kaissy variety and the final products are exported to USA, Europe and Canada while the other varieties, are consumed at syrian  and at some arabic countries markets.

The olive growing areas are near Aleppo  (36%) and Idled (24%). At the present, olives are harvested by hand. The production of table olives according the statistics published by INTERNATIONAL OLIVE OIL COUNCIL, “IOC” of last crop  2010-2011 was around 155.000 Tons, compared with: 

·         Egypt with 290,000 Tons

·         UE  with 672.000 Tons

·         All the world: 2.059.000 Tons

 

129.000 Tons of them are consumed in Syria (“IOC” source), then, the difference of 26.000 Tons are exported.

Source: GCSAR (Syria) + CRB (Italy) report

Syria and olive oil  production



With an all-time record of more than 200,000 tons of oil projected to be produced from olive trees this year, Syria has the potential of becoming a Middle East oil power of a sort even as its economy has been paralyzed by months of unrest.

Business and tourism in Syria has soured. But olive oil is a main stable for Syrians, who are one of the world’s top consumers, downing some five kilos (11 pounds) each annually on average. Five kilos is about five liters a person.

Even though the pro-democracy protests the olive harvest continues.

Syria produced 180,000 tons last year of olive oil, more than Turkey’s 160,000, but only a fraction of what the world leader, Spain, produced -- 1.2 million tons, or over half of the world’s olive oil. While Turkey has planted olive groves and expects to produce more than 700,000 tons by 2015 and become the world’s second-largest olive oil producer, its Levant neighbor Syria, beset with rebellion and retarded agriculture, has no national strategy beyond just hoping to hold its own as the fourth- or fifth-largest producer in the world.

The Syrian Ministry of Agriculture issued a statement on Tuesday saying that weather conditions are helping the harvest and forecasted a production of just 175,000 tons of olive oil. But the International Olive Oil Council (IOOC), a trade body in Madrid, estimates Syria will produce 200,000 tons.



Olive oil is a prominent part of the Syrian agriculture industry, contributing some 8 percent of total output. An estimated 100,000 families directly depend on olive growing. According to government statistics, it provides over 13 million workdays a year just picking them even though the harvest lasts just part of the year. These figures are expected to decrease, however, as the field becomes more mechanized.

Source: Read more