ANKARA, Oct. 24 (Xinhua) -- A hundred years ago, Hatice Alkan kept a sack of wheat seeds in her dowry chest, a traditional blessing of abundance and prosperity.
Alkan raised children, grew old, but forgot the seeds. She would never have imagined that her great-grandson would plant them and help revive a traditional wheat variety known as "red wheat" a century later, and that this would also spur a wider effort to recover and cultivate Türkiye's ancestral seeds that have fallen out of use in modern agriculture.
Across the Anatolia peninsula, farmers, researchers and local institutions have worked to recover crop varieties that may have been displaced by alternatives offering higher yields, more uniform growth and easier harvesting.
Beyond their agricultural value, these heirloom varieties can preserve genetic diversity and traits shaped by generations of cultivation under specific environmental conditions.
In northeastern Türkiye, one such crop is Kavilca, an ancient wheat variety traditionally grown in the provinces of Kars and Ardahan. The region's harsh continental climate, marked by some of the coldest winter temperatures in Türkiye, has helped shape local agricultural practices.
Kavilca is valued for its adaptation to these conditions, making its continued cultivation significant for both regional farming heritage and the conservation of traditional crop varieties.
In 2017, Mirasimiz Yerel Tohum Project, or "Our Heritage, Local Seeds," was launched as a national initiative under the auspices of Emine Erdogan, wife of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry.
Its collection efforts seek out seeds kept in household chests and wrapped in cloth, echoing traditional practices in Turkish brides' dowry chests.
Once collected, seeds can be identified, conserved in seed banks, multiplied, and studied for potential use in agricultural research and breeding. Some varieties may subsequently be registered or made available for wider cultivation, linking household preservation practices with more systematic efforts to protect Türkiye's agricultural genetic resources.
Meanwhile, the Turkish government also helps farmers to reduce the financial burden of adopting traditional varieties.
In 2021, 56 tonnes of kavilca seeds were distributed to 160 producers in Kars and Ardahan to expand cultivation. The farmers received a grant subsidy to cover 75 percent of eligible costs, as an incentive to cultivate a crop that might otherwise remain marginal.
At the Ataturk Agricultural Research Farm, operated by the Ankara Metropolitan Municipality, 45 local seed varieties and cultivars have achieved genetic and developmental stability after three years of selection and cultivation.
Products grown from heirloom seeds, including the traditional Ayas tomato and Ankara melon, have reached modern supermarket shelves, offering a potential route from conservation to commercial production.
Agricultural engineer Fatma Zehra Mutlu told reporters that the seeds would be distributed free of charge to local farmers, where they could complete their growing cycles under natural conditions.
Meanwhile, more than 1,500 indigenous seed samples were collected nationwide between 2020 and 2022 and stored in the national seed gene bank, according to reported figures. The government has also pursued the certification and registration of native varieties to support their formal market circulation.
Türkiye was updating its National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan to align with the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, the international roadmap adopted in 2022 to halt and reverse biodiversity loss, said Ibrahim Yumakli, Türkiye's minister of agriculture and forestry, last Friday at the Leaders' Summit of the 17th Conference of the Parties to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (COP17) in Yerevan, Armenia.
Describing the protection of biodiversity as a responsibility to future generations, the minister said Türkiye hopes to use the upcoming COP31 climate conference in Antalya to help translate climate commitments into concrete action and strengthen connections among climate policy, biodiversity conservation, land, and food security. Enidtem
