Autumn spring of saffron in Khorasan province
It is said that his original name was Zarparan; The flower that reduces the bright flags of the effects of depression has been cultivated in Khorasan for three thousand years and in addition to the prosperity of its trade, it has also used medicine, dyeing and producing calligraphic ink.
Cultivation is economically justified only in certain geographical offerings, which is why its production centers are so helpful. It is said that saffron is native to Iran. 93% of the world’s saffron is produced in Iran. The remaining seven percent are Spain, India, Singapore, Malaysia, Japan, Taiwan, China, France, Italy, Germany, Australia and Greece.
Saffron is almost rain-fed, the onion that is grown grows and reproduces itself under the soil. For the next seven to 10 years, it needs watering only three times a year, and during the flowering season, which lasts one month throughout the year from mid-November to mid-December, it produces fresh flowers every morning. The amount of saffron that can be harvested from the fields each year is different. Usually in the first year, only one or two kilograms of dry saffron is obtained from each hectare under saffron cultivation, in the second year its amount reaches four to six kilograms, from the third year onwards, 10 kilograms and more of saffron per hectare Dry harvested. Sample farmers have harvested even more than 30 kilos of saffron per hectare; Considering that the price of each kilo of dry saffron in the harvest season can reach more than five million tomans, saffron cultivation has a good economic benefit.
Cultivation of saffron is mostly a family affair. Most of the farmers in Khorasan spend their time harvesting and cleaning flowers during the saffron harvest season. Continues throughout the day. However, those with larger fields have to use seasonal workers to ensure that all the flowers are picked during the day. Here, workers are paid based on the amount of mud they collect, instead of wages.
Ahmed is one of those who come to Khaf to work at this time of year. I am studying experimental high school, I have to take the entrance exam in 3 years, but I do not know whether I will take the entrance exam or not, he says. You can make money here by working harder than studying. Here, on the ground, for every kilo of flowers that can be harvested for five thousand tomans, from 40 in the morning until night, 40, 150 thousand tomans were worked. No one is studying anymore!
Although saffron is grown to a large extent in the dry season, its poison and fertilizer are not forgotten. There is no land that has not been fertilized, says Ahmed. Flowers that are truly organic are no longer found at all, but these toxins and fertilizers are not harmful to the plant. We have not yet seen, for example, a flower whose feet have been fertilized change color and smell.
These days, women work less on the fields. Flower harvests cannot be kept long, says Mr Khafi. The longer it stays, the harder it becomes to clean. Therefore, even if we hire workers for the land, it costs women to stay at home and clean the flowers.
Mr. Kermani, whose wife is currently cleaning saffron in Bajanagh’s house, says: But those who have large land have a good income; Of course, it has its difficulties, but there is nothing without difficulty. We clean and dry the same saffron ourselves and sell it after the harvest season. I, who work on the Tehran-Khaf line and the Mashhad-Khaf line, take orders myself and take the cleaned saffron to them. You also have a fantasy that there is no fainting in it.
One of the difficulties in harvesting flowers is that the saffron plant has needle leaves that hurt the hand. Apart from this, all the steps of harvesting saffron must be done by hand. Mr. Sarkhosh, who received his bachelor’s degree in agriculture from the University of Tehran and holds several inventions and scientific papers in the field of agriculture, says: Help is not made or has not reached the stage of industrial production. Currently, most of the work done by the machine is drying the saffron, which is done with a machine similar to a fruit-dryer, and the other is a machine for removing saffron onions from the soil. Although the saffron onion stays in the soil for many years and flowers, after the end of the flowering period, it should be removed from the soil so as not to poison the soil; To do this, a machine similar to a potato harvester has been built to remove onions from the soil. The rest of the steps are still done by hand, and this increases the price of saffron.
The income of saffron farmers may be relatively better than other farmers, but intermediaries are still working, and in the harvest season the price of fresh flowers and saffron, which has increased, is lower than in other seasons. It is said that until a few years ago, when farmers were in the sky, traders bought saffron cheaply during the harvest season and then sold it themselves at a higher price. In the markets of cities that are closer to saffron production centers, there is still a commotion at the time of saffron harvest. Many who have smaller fields and less capital sell their dry and clean saffron, perhaps 10 to 15 percent less than the city price; Of course, not everyone does this.
In one of the older villages, which had no children, he devoted all his money, he set up a fund in which all the villagers would go and sell their saffron to that fund during the harvest season, and they would take the money, and when the price of saffron went up again, he said. They sold the saffron and put the money in the box for the next year. They have been doing this for years now so that farmers do less. Those who have savings and money keep saffron themselves and sell it after the harvest season so as not to lose money.
Saffron, like many commodities and products, is an investment that has not been planned to maximize its production profit. It has been argued for years that Iran, despite producing more than 90% of the world’s saffron, is still not successful enough in foreign saffron trade. After all these years, we are still exporting saffron without packaging so that others can benefit, said Mr Sarkhosh. Most of the saffron sold under Spanish brand names in the world is actually Iranian saffron; However, everyone in the world knows saffron as Spain, and our traders find it cheaper to send saffron in bulk to Spain so that they can plan and invest in its international sale.
Climate change and global warming have led to the best saffron cultivation areas, which in the past decades were in Ghaenat and the southern regions of Khorasan, now reach more northern lands and areas such as Torbat Heydariyeh. This situation threatens the whole saffron cultivation in the country, but it seems that the danger has not been felt enough yet. At the moment, the wheel of the saffron trade is turning and those who are in charge are satisfied.
Get Social