Lavender oil production begins in Tatlısu
AGRICULTURE and Natural Resources Minister Dursun Oğuz has visited Tatlısu Municipality’s lavender oil production plant.
Mr Oğuz met with Tatlısu Mayor Hayri Orçan at the facility, which is the first of its kind in North Cyprus, and was informed about lavender oil extraction and then observed the process from lavender plants harvested by the government’s Agricultural Research Department and Forestry Department.
Mr Oğuz said that lavender seedlings were donated by Turkey’s Agriculture and Forestry and distributed to local government authorities.
He said that the plant can be processed and its oil can be used in “many sectors” such as medicine and cosmetics and that there is a “high demand” for lavender, which is suitable for places that have an “arid climate”, such as the TRNC.
Mr Oğuz added that members of the public can also grow their own lavender, and that by establishing a distillation unit, lavender can be “transformed into an economic value rather than a visual one”.
He thanked Tatlısu Municipality and Mr Orçan for “motivating all the producers”.
“Now, when lavender is harvested in the TRNC, there is a facility where it will be processed and the oil will be extracted,” he continued.
“Hopefully, we will enable more of the private sector and organisations to enter this field. At this point, our aim is to create awareness [of lavender] as an agricultural product and to develop different business sectors.”
He added that “our duty as the ministry” is to bring “other plant species suitable for the country’s climate to the TRNC” and thanked Turkey
for donating the seedlings and “facilitating these steps”.
Mr Orçan first thanked the Agriculture Ministry of Turkey for providing the seedlings and said that the lavender oil production facility will “add economic value outside of tourism”.
He stated that lavender is drought resistant, only needs to be watered for half an hour once every 10 to 15 days, and can be grown in otherwise “barren” land.
Lavender oil is in “great demand globally because it is the most important ingredient in the cosmetics industry” and can be “sold all over Europe through the Green Line Regulation” Mr Orçan added.
He stated that they are processing lavender harvests in Tatlısu “for the first time this year” followed by lavender from other regions and harvests from the Agriculture and Natural Resources
Ministry, with plans to produce more next year.
He also said that approximately 400 kilos of lavender can be processed every hour at the Tatlısu plant, and that there is “enough for the whole country”.
Mr Orçan thanked Mr Oğuz for his support and also Tatlısu Municipality’s sister municipality in Turkey, the Konya Karatay Municipality, which “gifted this facility to us”.