All our employees contribute to our fruits with their ideas, efforts and emotions

Our country is located at the heart of an agricultural geography. As Anadolu Group and Anadolu Etap, our connection with agriculture, which is critical for human existence, is based on our human-oriented approach. In all our efforts, we observe the benefits we can present to human kind and the environment along with the other living species that are critical for human existence. We question how to improve negative conditions and how we can sustain this ecosystem. We are establishing all our facilities and factories with this perspective. We strive to leave a more livable world to the future generations by preserving the balance between nature, natural resources and human beings in the most efficient way.

I work as Plantation Operations Supervisor at Anadolu Etap’s Tahirova Farm in Balıkesir. At Anadolu Etap, we always ask ourselves the question “What can we do to present the best to our people?”. In this context, we are striving to keep up with the developing world by following the technology and global innovations in agriculture. We take steps to bring good practices together with our employees and customers. We organize trainings from experts for all our employees, collaborate with universities, conduct R&D studies, create projects and guide the farmers in the region, in the light of this information. While supplying our customers with our products, we analyze every drop of water that falls on the soil, the development of our trees, every step of our practices, and bring high quality and healthy fruits we grow to our customers in different geographies of the world.

We attach significant importance to training and the development of our people. Thanks to the constant support of employee development, I have frequently encountered success stories at Anadolu Etap. Our friends advancing from workman to engineering with these supports are among the best examples of this culture. A friend of ours, who started working as a farmworker in our Çanakkale farm, first completed agricultural training by obtaining an associate degree. Afterwards, our friend continued with a bachelor’s degree and graduated from the department of agricultural engineering. After graduation, he started to work as a Farm Supervisor in our Denizli farm. Similarly, we have many success stories with our technicians and operators who received special training. Hence, we increase the level of education in our human resources and agriculture.

All our employees contribute to the fruits we grow in our farms with their ideas, efforts and emotions including people from our head office, our farm workers, our factory workers and our harvesting workers. Dealing with living material naturally creates an emotional bond in our work. We always say wholeheartedly, “This place has grown in our hands”, a sentence that reflects a significant effort. We work with the dedication derived from all our people’s efforts.

We are also aware of our responsibilities towards the Anatolian people. We call thousands of seasonal workers, who come to our farms from different regions of our country during the harvest season “our guest workers”. We host our guest workers in our lodgings where they can fulfill all their needs during the harvest period lasting 8 months. We also provide training to our workers; we benefit from their experience. While adults work in the farm, we do not forget the children of our workers. With our MİÇO (Children of Seasonal Agricultural Workers) program, we ensure that hundreds of children who move in with their families continue their education without interruption. Working with the National Education Directorates and Public Education Directorates; we ensure that they continue their education both through our transportation system and with the kindergartens we set up in our farms. The whole team is working with heart and soul in the MİÇO program for our children. We support the increase in the number of qualified farmers by providing sustainable agriculture training to our farmers with our AgroAcademy program.

Despite the pandemic that has affected the whole world since the beginning of 2020, we have not abandoned our promise of “Healthy Fruits for Healthy Generations”. We continue to work and produce day and night in the field and our farms in order to meet the healthy nutrition needs of society. At our farms, established on a total of 30.000 HA of land, we continue our work without any interruption, through high level hygiene conditions, ensuring social distance, wearing our masks even in our harvesting works with thousands of workers. We prioritized the health of our employees above anything. We kept our quarantine tents ready for any positive case. We progressed by taking protective measures without compromising Occupational Health and Safety rules. We started our season with winter pruning and protected each of our trees and fruits by using automatic anti-freeze systems in cold weather with the data we received from the meteorology stations that we constantly monitor. We used our net systems against hail risk. In harsh climatic conditions, the entire team stood on guard duty for days until the morning. We are happy to keep our promise to our society and our people by growing more than 11 kinds of fruits from 150 types in a healthy, quality, and efficient manner. By prioritizing our people, our human, we will continue to produce “healthy fruits for healthy generations”.