TURKEY
Ă–zpekler plans its own feed production unit
Smoked trout for the German market Turkey produces more farmed trout than any other farmed species. Of the total farmed ďŹ sh production, trout amounted to 45% in 2015 thanks to the almost 2,000 inland ďŹ sh farms that exist across the country.
Ă–zpekler has ten freshwater sites where trout is farmed mainly in raceways and but also in cages.
T
he presence of plentiful water in the form of rivers, lakes, dam reservoirs, and artificial lakes is among the reasons that trout production has multiplied. One of the companies that illustrates this growth is the family-owned Ă–zpekler, a farmer and processor of trout that was established by Mustafa Ă–zpek in the 80s.
the fish farms flow through systems with concrete raceways are used to cultivate the fish, but at two of the sites cages have been deployed. All the farms are at a radius of about 125 km from Denizli in the western part of the country and the site of the first farm.
Today the entire production of trout, some 6,000 tonnes, is exported to Germany in the form of smoked trout fillets and barbecue-ready fish. The latter is gutted trout in aluminium trays which is being sold to the German retail market through a distributor in Germany. Exports to Germany
started in 2003 and have continued ever since. GĂśkhan Ulubahsi, the export manager, was born and brought up in Germany and returned to Turkey and started working with Ă–zpekler in the middle of 2015. A native speaker of both German and Turkish and fluent in English to boot,
Farming sites use raceways, cages Mr Özpek was one of the pioneers of the Turkish trout aquaculture industry farming trout initially in the mid 70’s. After a break for six years the family started the activity again in the late 80s, beginning with a farming site that had a capacity of 40 tonnes and gradually increasing it to 200 tonnes. Over the years, the company acquired or established other farms, so that today the company can boast ten sites including a hatchery. At most of 46
Mustafa Ă–zpek founded Ă–zpekler and manages it together with his sons, Osman Ă–zpek (pictured) and Yasin Ă–zpek.
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