FROM GRANDFATHER TO GRANDSON

Farming is a family tradition going back to my great-grandfathers, who came from Kerkük to modern Şanlıurfa as a chieftain in the Ottoman period, and passed down in the Republic period from my grandfather to my mother and aunt, from them to me…

Since 1940s, my grandfather Mehmet Sadri Buluntu practiced his profession as a forest engineer while carrying on farming, the family tradition inherited from ancestors of Buluntu, known as one of the long-established families in Urfa. My grandfather conveyed his passion for science and education to farming by being the first farmer in the region using the tractor and harvester besides the state-of-the-art agricultural technologies of that time.

With the passing away in 1995 of my grandfather, who pioneered the agricultural development in the region, my mother Ayşe Şenel Girgin, a journalist, and my aunt Neşever Zileli, a high criminal court judge, could not not give up agricultural production inherited from their father. They worked hard and learned a lot to carry on farming together with their profession…

Now, I’m carrying the torch… After having completed my master degree in agricultural engineering, I worked as a manager in the international food business. Now, I’m passionately pursuing my professional career as a farmer since 2009, and I thoroughly enjoy being involved in a real production. I am trying to harvest and serve the best of local bounty, straight from Harran land.

 

Mehmet Girgin
Agricultural Engineer MSc