Azerbaijan, Ganja, 3 May /corr. Trend U.Ismaylova, V.Mammadov, P.Aliyeva / The western regions of Azerbaijan may face problem of bread deficit. Fatoglu OSC, one of the largest Turkish companies producing and supplying flour in the western regions of Azerbaijan, stopped its activity due to exhaustion of reserves on 3 May, Trend regional correspondent reports.
Fatoglu OSC supplies flour mainly to Ganja, Shamkir, Akstafa, Gazakh, Tovuz, Goranboy, Yevlakh, Dashkesen, Gadabay as well as several southern regions of the country. The annual production capacity of the OSC makes up 8,000 tons of flour.
A source in the company stated by telephone on 3 May that the reserves in Fatoglu exhausted due to the issue that the company purchases grain mainly from Kazakhstan, which in April imposed a ban on grain export till new harvesting in September 2008 to protect internal market from worldwide grain price increase.
The company said that currently alternative sources of grain import are being searched.
"We think that we will be able to re-establish our activity in the near ten days after signing a new contract on grain supply," the same source stated.
After Fatoglu stopped its activity, the prices for 200-250g bread in the western and southern regions increased from AZN 0.20 to AZN 0.30 and 300-400g to AZN 0.40.
Commenting on the fact of possible bread deficit, Azerbaijan's Ministry of Agriculture, Ismet Abbasov, briefed the media on 3 May that irrespective of measures to supply food grain, 'we can not fully cover our demand and therefore, we will be importing grain from other countries'.
The key grain exporters for Azerbaijan are Kazakhstan, Russia and Ukraine. Azerbaijan's annual grain demand is 3mln tons, with 1mln tons of it being imported. After Russia applied additional €22 to the exported grain, the export to Azerbaijan was stopped till full introduction of the changes.
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