Georgia regulates its hazelnut production to boost exports
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Georgia is fostering hazelnut production by launching new rules to regulate hazelnut exports and imports, ensure goods are high quality and eliminate labelling issues.
The Government of Georgia approved the technical regulations at yesterday’s Government meeting.
Georgia’s Agriculture Minister Otar Danelia believed there were vast opportunities to export hazelnuts and the demand for Georgian nuts was increasing internationally.
Georgia received $184 million USD by exporting hazelnuts in European Union (EU) member countries in 2014 and 2015. This was 30 percent of the total agricultural products export volume,” said Danelia.
We see there are huge export opportunities for Georgian hazelnuts in the EU, so we designed a state program and created technical regulations to further develop this,” he said.
The Minister said the regulations "will strictly control” the quality of hazelnuts Georgia produced. The regulations will help ensure all the nuts produced locally would meet top export quality and be easily sold all throughout the EU.
To develop the technical regulations, the Georgian Government teamed up with the local business sector and the Georgian Hazelnut Growers Association.
Georgia’s role as a global hazelnut producer is strengthening with the opening of a new nut drying and storage facility.
Georgian nuts are invading the European market and are fast becoming the country’s main agricultural export product.
Georgia is fostering hazelnut production by launching a dedicated hazelnut sector development programme.
One year on from Georgia’s EU integration the country is already showing immense progress, particularly in the agriculture sector where growth is evident in a range of directions.
Leading specialists, scientists, delegates and representatives of local and foreign enterprises, exporter organisations, Governmental bodies and civil society are teaming up to develop a Non-Timber Forest Products’ sector in Georgia.
Georgian nuts will soon become a globally recognised brand – this is the main goal of the Nut Production State Program which is launching today.
The Government has launched a new initiative allowing farmers from all over Georgia to easily learn about the existing and new agricultural services offered by the state and how to better benefit from these agricultural programs.
"In the history of Independent Georgia there have never been so many opportunities for hard-working people with initiative to launch or broaden their business.”
To strengthen the country’s role as a major global hazelnut exporter, Georgia is launching a new program to increase the quality of exported nuts and sell them worldwide at a premium price to improve the economic livelihoods of more than 50,000 local hazelnut growers.
A Georgian man could spend four years behind bars after he allegedly used falsified tax documents to export low quality hazelnuts to Germany.
Nut farmers, wine exporters and meat processors in Georgia have enjoyed a series of workshops to learn how to benefit from the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area (DCFTA) deal.
The export of nuts from Georgia will exceed the export of wine in the near future, Andrei Yarmak, economist and expert at the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) told East Fruit, an international analytical platform for fruit and vegetables.