Could you briefly talk about Hishtil Toros Fidecilik A.Ş.
Our company was first established in Turkey in 1996 with the partnership of Sheffer Transtürk Holding Hishtil Ltd. started its operations as With the acquisition of company shares by Toros Tarım in 1999, the company was renamed Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik. In 2019, it became a part of Tekfen Tarım, which acquired 50% of Toros Tarım's shares.
Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik, which was operating on 27 decares of land, 12 decares of which is closed, in Antalya at the first stage, continues its activities on 120 decares of land, of which 50 decares are closed. In 2015, in addition to our Antalya production facility, another 80 decares of land in Adana, 30 decares of which is closed, was added to the production facilities of Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik.
As Histhil-Toros Fidecilik, our most important issue is our quality in grafted seedling production. We use the latest technologies known in our production. There is a grafted seedling market of 250 thousand in 2001 and more than 200 million today.
Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik made its first trials in 1998 and started commercial sales in 2000.
Grafted seedlings, which have become widespread in fields and greenhouses in recent years and provide a significant solution to soil-borne diseases that cause yield and quality loss in production, were first produced by Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik in Turkey.
With the high demand for grafted seedlings, Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik has accelerated its investments in this field and increased its grafted seedling production capacity from 10 million units/year to 25 million units/year in the last 10 years.
Grafted watermelon, grafted tomato, grafted eggplant, grafted cucumber, grafted pepper and grafted melon vegetable seedlings are produced in our facilities today.
In the past, soil-borne diseases and pests caused serious losses in vegetable production. Together with the strong rootstocks we used in the production of grafted seedlings, the seedlings have now gained resistance against soil-borne fungal diseases ( Fusarium sp. Pythium sp., Rhizoctonia sp., and Verticillium sp .) and nematodes, and serious production losses due to these reasons have come to an end. With these benefits, the preference of grafted seedlings in vegetable production is increasing day by day.
For example, in regions where watermelon production is intense, such as Adana, at least 5-6 years of rotation was required for pests and diseases in the fields where watermelon was planted. But with the supply-demand balance and the alternation, the producers started to find no fields to plant watermelons, and in this case, the producers were planting watermelons again in the field where they planted watermelon in the previous season. Of course, this led to serious losses in yield due to diseases and pests. With the grafted watermelon seedling, the producers have succeeded in getting yield by producing watermelon in the same production area every year. This is valid for all species such as tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplants, melons, peppers, etc. grown with grafted seedlings.
We can list the benefits of grafted seedlings under 7 main headings as follows:
- Fewer plants per decare, high yield
- High resistance to soil diseases
- Long production and harvest period
- The chance of planting on the same land every year without alternation
- low production cost
- High quality fruit rate
- Less chemical use
Our employees may change, but since the technology and production protocols we use do not change, the continuity in our seedling production quality never changes. Hishtil-Toros does not know how to produce cheap and poor quality seedlings. Because each customer's order is special for us and we have a production cost brought by the technology, protocols and quality specs we have used in seedling production. We do not avoid any additional costs during the production of our seedlings.
“ True to its name ” is an adjective valid for the seed, and this adjective is also valid for our seedlings. In us, the rootstock + scion indicated on the labels is what it means, that is, “correctness on its behalf” is complete. However, it is a known fact that there are differences between the rootstock specified on the labels and the rootstock used in the market. Unfortunately, we still hear the grievances of the manufacturers regarding this.
Due to the fact that we produce seedlings that are “true to its name”, Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik always attracts attention and demand from the farmers, and it plants the seedling box containing the Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik brand in the most precious place of its greenhouse.
In the meantime, whether straight or grafted seedlings are produced, the production of both starts with the seed. In this context, the seed's disease-free, high germination, and good plowing power is directly related to the seedling quality. As Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik, we put the seeds of some species into use after sterilizing them in our seed disinfection unit, which eliminates the threat of seed-borne diseases that we consider serious and important.
We use corrugated viols, which we call RS (Root System), in production. This system ensures the root development of the seedling and its good adaptation to the soil in a short time after planting. At the same time, RS technology can provide earliness compared to viols of the same volume depending on the season and growing conditions, as well as the seedling starting to use the plant nutrients in the soil after planting without being stressed.
Apart from this, we have a bottom irrigation system, which is not available in many nurseries. The purpose of this system is to prevent the risk of spreading some seed-borne diseases by overhead irrigation.
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In addition, as Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik, we produce according to the GSPP (Good Seed and Plant Practices) Good Seed and Plant Practices protocol. With GSPP, which is an international protocol, it is mainly aimed to prevent the transmission of seed-borne diseases to seeds and plants, and organizations that implement this system are also periodically checked.
As Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik, we also produce with artificial lighting in our grafted seedling production. Production with artificial lighting creates a wide variety of added values that positively affect the quality of the vaccine.
Due to this and similar technological systems, Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik's grafted seedlings always create the added value they deserve and are in demand in the market.
When the producer sows flat seedlings, possible damages from soil-based fusarium and nematodes may occur, and this may prevent the seedling from progressing until fruit formation, perhaps causing no healthy production in the garden-field and no yield. This risk is always present. In this context, it is not easy to give an equation for the question of whether there is a yield difference between grafted seedlings and straight seedlings.
In fact, when you look at it, the use of grafted seedlings seems to be a necessity in the cases I mentioned above. In the production made with grafted seedlings, these risks are eliminated.
In addition, it is known that grafted seedlings provide a yield increase of up to 50% compared to straight seedlings. In other words, when you look at the total yield, it is certain that the grafted seedling has an undeniable advantage.
Grafted seedlings are not used for yield only. But in recent years, there are farmers who produce cocktail tomatoes produced from grafted seedlings in Fethiye region, leaving about 6-7 branches on a trunk. Since the rootstock used here is a strong rootstock, it can feed 6-7 branches. In this way, producers both reduce the number of plantings per decare and increase their yield. When we look at this example, it also creates a contrast with the efficiency emphasis I have just emphasized.
This system, which is known as rock wool, is especially used in soilless production. In this system, the seedlings are transferred to the cubes filled with rock wool and when they reach a certain size, the shipment is made.
Some producers who produce without soil need to gain time in order to bring their greenhouses, whose production has been delayed, to suitable planting conditions. In this context, they gain valuable time by keeping their seedlings in our nurseries for a part of the production time that they cannot gain in their own production. But since it is not possible to keep the seedlings in normal viols during these long waiting times, the seedlings are kept in rock wool cubes, which we call rockwoll.
The length of these seedlings can reach up to about 45-50 cm. We even receive requests from hydroponic producers regarding the first two clusters of seedlings to be in flower and to ship them after pollination with bees. However, we do not prefer this production due to the risk of Tomato Brown rugose fruit virus (ToBRFV ) being carried by bumblebees, which has become a problem in tomato cultivation in recent years. With this technique, producers gain a production advantage of approximately 1-2 months during production seasons.
As in every sector, digital marketing channels have become one of the indispensable elements of the agricultural sector in today's world. As Hishtil-Toros Fidecilik, we are aware of the contributions of the digital world and we will continue to invest in this technology.
We congratulate hortiturkey for breaking new ground with its structure and functioning, unlike digital agriculture publications in the world. In particular, hortiturkey stands out as a very successful platform in terms of showing the products related to the content read instead of company advertisements in the system to the right audience and examining these products, and even interacting with the visitors viewing the products and the companies. It is another source of happiness and pride that hortiturkey, which has been built with this mentality and realized a first in the world, is leaving our country.
I believe that the platform will open new commercial doors for companies abroad as well as domestically, with the launch of the platform in English and Arabic this month and its global expansion, and the meeting of companies with foreign users, just like in Turkey.
In this period when domestic and international travels have decreased with the pandemic, I think that hortiturkey will provide support to companies in terms of brand and product awareness, while adding positive value in terms of technical and sales.
I congratulate Hortiturkey once again and wish it well for Turkish agriculture.