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Afyonkarahisar'da Yeşil Dönüşüm Projeleri KonuşulduAfyonkarahisar'da Yeşil Dönüşüm Projeleri Konuşuldu

Isparta's Güneykent town, which alone meets 65% of the world's rose oil demand, has begun its rose harvest. The harvest, which will continue until the end of June, is expected to yield between 8 and 12 thousand tons of rose petals this year.

This year, the rose harvest in Güneykent started with a slight delay. The collected rose flowers are taken to factories to be turned into rose oil. The roses are boiled in giant 500-kilogram tanks in the factory to extract the oil from the flowers.

Zehra Suna, who harvests roses in the field in Güneykent, stated that picking roses is their bread and butter and they love it since they have been doing it since childhood. Suna said, "We have to wake up very early in the morning. Sometimes it rains, and there are thorns and bees on the roses. It's hard to walk in mud with rubber boots, but we are grateful for the income. We invite everyone to the homeland where the roses smile in the sky."

Nehir Satılmış, who came to help her neighbors in the field, said, "This is our neighbors' field. I came here to earn money. Picking roses is easy, the only difficulty is the mud when it rains. I came here to pick roses last year and again this year. I'm a novice."



"The harvest is about 20 days delayed this year"

Zühtü Küçükbacak, who has been farming on a one-hectare field in Güneykent for about 30 years, said that the cold had hit the rose flower this year, "Our crop was affected by the cold, but it returned. It will not be the same as last year because we suffered damage from the crop. We do the labor and apply pesticides ourselves. We also bring in workers during harvest time." Küçükbacak, who said that the rose harvest was almost over at this time last year, added, "It's about 20 days late this year. The harvest will last about 20 days, and after that date, there will be no more roses."

Küçükbacak stated that there was frost in March, "There were consecutive freezes. The frost affected the roses when the buds were about to come out, but the rose bloomed again as the weather warmed up. According to last year's yield, there is a 50% loss. It was 5 tons last year, but it will be 2,500 kilograms this year."



"Between 8 to 12 thousand tons of rose petals are produced in Isparta"

Osman Döner, the rose factory's oil expert, said they boiled the roses brought by the producers in tanks at 100 degrees Celsius. Döner said, "After boiling the roses, we start to cool them down before moving on to the distillation system. We take the water extracted during the distillation process and pour it into the second container, emptying all the water inside it. This process continues until it is complete. A tank in the factory takes 500 kilograms of rose petals and 1.5 tons of water. One kilogram of oil is extracted from 4 tons of flowers per day on average. For example, you will get 10 kilograms of oil if you process 40 tons. The season may last longer than usual due to the cool weather. Between 8 to 12 thousand tons of rose petals are produced in Isparta in general."