RIYADH — After the “date and palm tree” culture was bound to the Arabian Peninsula, Saudis managed to take it to 107 international destinations under local and global programs and partnerships to market dates and increase production to reach various international markets.

The National Center for Palms and Dates is among the top supporters for this rapid growth in the dates sector through implementing several programs to develop the sector in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, boost its efficiency and enhance its productivity in a bid to increase its accessibility to targeted countries, where all these efforts contributed to making the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia the top exporter of dates worldwide.

Saudi Arabia is home to more than 33 million palm trees and over 123,000 agricultural holdings, in addition to having 157 date factories, which contribute positively to supporting the date and palm sector and many transformative and food industries to include food and other industries, such as medical, cosmetics and construction materials industries.

In numbers, Saudi Arabia’s support and marketing of dates positively affects the sector, where the value of date exports in 2021 grew by 7.1% with a value of SAR927 million, while the increase in the exported amount in the same year went up by 17% to 215,000 tons.

Riyadh is scheduled to host the second edition of the International Exhibition for Dates on Thursday under the supervision of the National Center for Palms and Dates and with the participation of several date producers and farmers. — SPA