ANKARA: The world’s analysts estimate Turkey’s sunseed crop in the current 2017/18 season at 1.6 MMT. At the same time, the estimate made by Turkish market participants themselves is more conservative (1.45 MMT) but also record high for the country.
The sunseed market’s potential had to make Turkey less dependent on foreign raw material, the more so as the government has fully exploited its regulatory tools for supporting local growers. As it is known, the Turkish government widely uses a system of farmer subsidies to stimulate production of certain crop products.
Despite the bumper sunseed crop and contrary to expectations and analyst forecasts, the first five months of the 2017/18 season saw a significant rise in sunseed purchases from foreign markets. They are up 111.7% from the same time last year.
