İlayda Sorku
Ahead of the Producers’ March to be held on Saturday 22 November the LEFT Party Uşak Provincial Organisation stepped up its field work. Party members set up stands in the city centre to call for the march and visited 30 villages across the province to meet producers. They held agricultural panels in the villages of Ağaçbeyli and Delihıdırlı. Peasants described how they had been forced to abandon production because of worsening economic conditions over the years, pressure from mining companies and agricultural collapse. In the conversations held in the villages the problems of producers were heard and solution proposals were discussed.
WE CAN’T SOW, WE LIVE IN DEBT
Peasants explained the collapse of production with concrete examples. Farmers said they can no longer plant because input costs are indexed to the dollar. Peasants said that because there is no purchase guarantee their products remain in their hands and that they have to sell their products to traders at a loss because of their debts. Tobacco producers working through contract farming said they had survived for years through the debt system called advance payments and that this method had brought them to the point of completely abandoning production.
MINING DUST RUINED AGRICULTURE
Producers living in villages near Kışladağ Gold Mine, owned by Eldorado Gold, which has dried up the taps in Uşak in particular, reported that agriculture has completely collapsed. Peasants said that the dust from the mine has dried up many fruits and vegetables, and that livestock farming has disappeared.
One peasant said, ‘Everyone only grows enough to feed themselves. There is no land left to graze animals. We have given up on livestock farming.’
THE SOLUTION IS TO GET RID OF THE COMPANY
LEFT Party Uşak Provincial Spokesperson Mahmut Uludağ emphasised the threat the mine poses to the city in a statement following fieldwork: ‘For three years, peasants have been banned from digging wells so that water can go to the mine. In Uşak, water continues to be supplied for six hours a day.
The State Hydraulic Works (DSİ) and the AKP have entered into a race with the municipality to build reservoirs and dig wells. It is clear that none of these will solve Uşak’s water problem. They are stalling the people of Uşak. The only solution for Uşak’s water is to expel Eldorado Gold, which operates the Kışladağ mine, and to close down its local collaborator, Tüprag. They all know this, but they don’t say it.‘
Uludağ also reacted to the company signing protocols with the municipality and institutions under the name of ’social assistance,‘ saying, “They signed protocols to build a teachers’ residence and to purchase dialysis machines for the Eşme State Hospital. The mayor must immediately withdraw his signature from this protocol. If they collected the tax they themselves declared from the mining company, dozens of teachers’ residences and dozens of dialysis machines could be built. Let’s chase away the water thief Eldorado Gold.”
DEMANDS ARE CLEAR
Uludağ outlined the demands against the contract farming system that is suffocating producers: “We want basic inputs to be produced and distributed by the public sector, purchase guarantees for basic products, the restructuring of privatised public institutions in favour of producers, the cancellation of contract farming practices, and the cancellation of electricity, water and Agricultural Bank debts for subsistence farmers.” He also emphasised that Turkey must sign the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Peasants.
The LEFT Party reiterated its call for the Producer March to be held on Saturday, 22 November, stating that all these problems are the result of the policies of the ruling government. Uludağ concluded his remarks by saying, “We expect the participation of all our people in our march to end the reign for bread, land, water and homeland.”
Note: This article is translated from the original article titled Memleket için birlikte yürüyelim, published in BirGün newspaper on November 21, 2025.
