Identification of socio-economic structures and production problems of pomegranate producers: Sampling of Manavgat, district of Antalya

The aim of the study is to determine socio-economic structures of the enterprises producing pomegranate in Manavgat, District of Antalya, as well as problems encountered by the enterprises in production and marketing, and their consideration on pomegranate production in the future. The core material of the study is the primary data obtained from 73 enterprises producing pomegranate in Manavgat District, who are determined using proportional sampling method. It has been established in this study that the average age of the farmer is 55.44, that their average experiences are 11,66 years, that the average number of a child that they have is 2,76, that their pomegranate harvest is 63,807 tons, that in 98,6% of pomegranate orchard, Hicaznar pomegranate variety is cultivated. It has been further ascertained in the study that the enterprises cultivate pomegranate on an average of 20,305 decares. Besides, it has been determined that 38.4% of the producers are definitely considering lay off of the pomegranate production, 4.1% consider to increase their capacity at the earliest opportunity and 49.3% wish to continue as is. In the study, it was found that the producers prefer the pomegranate cultivation because of well profit gainedinitially from the production thereof. It has been assessed that the enterprises participating in the questionnaire study has no storage means for their products, and that they have difficulties due to lack of becoming a cooperative on marketing of products, and they consider that the cooperatives to be established on pomegranate marketing in the production zone would 95.9% come in useful in the product marketing activities. In accordance with the results obtained from the research, the enterprises in question need to be established producer organization (cooperative) to find a solution to the problems such as marketing of the their pomegranate products, low input cost, operating facility and storage. Keywords: Manavgat, pomegranate production, problems, socio-economic structure