Minister of Agriculture and Forestry Vahit Kirişci, who made an official visit to Azerbaijan, attended the opening of the 15th Azerbaijan International Agriculture Fair “Caspian Agro” in the capital Baku. Kirişci visited the stands in the fair area with Azerbaijan Prime Minister Ali Asadov, Azerbaijan Agriculture Minister İnam Kerimov, Azerbaijan Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources Muhtar Babayev. Minister Kirişci also participated in the Fish Bread Festival, which was organized for the first time within the framework of the fair, and distributed fish and bread to the visitors.
Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources of Azerbaijan Babayev stated that many types of fish were brought to Azerbaijan from Turkey and said, “Fish will be cooked and distributed at the festival. Our main goal here is to consume fish products more and to spread fish culture even more.”
Stating that he is very pleased to be in Azerbaijan, Kirişci said, “We made our first visit to our friendly and brotherly Azerbaijan, as we have traditionally made. I would like to express firstly the greetings of our President and his affections for our Azerbaijani brothers. Today, with the participation of our Azerbaijani prime minister and our minister friends, we celebrated the opening of the 15th fair. He said: “It is a very special and very well organized fair both in terms of participation and participants. I learned that nearly 450 companies participated as exhibitors. I was very happy and very happy that 54 of them were Turkish entrepreneurs,” he said.
Stressing that Turkey has given great importance to the subject of aquaculture in the last 20 years, Kirişci said, “Thank God we have also received the fruits of the importance we have given. We both increased our production and increased our exports. Turkey is currently only in the field of fisheries products, amounting to 1 billion 400 million dollars. “It has become an important exporting country. We wanted our brothers and sisters to taste it, too,” he said.
Making statements to the journalists later, Kirişci stated that the Armenian occupation in Karabakh came to an end and said, “We have brothers who have left this geography related to this occupation. It is not enough and meaningless to say that these brothers return to their lands again. It is absolutely impossible for them to live their daily lives when they return to the lands they left. “There must be an activity that they can sustain. The most prominent activities in such geographies are agricultural activities,” he said.
“WE HAVE JOINT PROJECTS”
Stating that people who will return to Karabakh should be in a production where they can meet their own needs, Minister Kirişci said, “There are projects that we will implement with our relevant ministers and ministries in friendly and brotherly Azerbaijan. These projects are about the reconstruction of these areas in the agricultural field. What do we mean by this development. Production and animal production should start here. This place has very important demands and needs. On the one hand, the needed forage crops are grown, on the other hand, other animal husbandry activities that you can think of, such as cattle, sheep and goats, will also be taught here. It’s not enough, we also have a food leg. Produced products need to be transformed into a format that can be used by consumers, by means of a food industry. We export agricultural products to Azerbaijan. At the same time, we need to discuss what we can buy from Azerbaijan. because b We are not just a winner, we are a country that wins while winning. We have such an identity. This is what sets us apart from other countries. But if necessary, we want these brothers to earn by making this production in the city, in their own geographies, by carrying out activities related to this production on site,” he said.
Minister Vahit Kirişci met with the Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources of Azerbaijan Mukhtar Babayev within the framework of his visit.
Within the framework of his Baku contacts, Kirişci will also meet with the President of the Azerbaijan Food Safety Agency Goşgar Tehmezli and the Minister of Agriculture of Azerbaijan Inam Kerimov.
