Pomegranates from Geokchai
The history of Azerbaijan is inseparably linked to the culture of pomegranate cultivation, going back deep into centuries. Traditionally, pomegranates have been cultivated almost in every region of Azerbaijan. The pomegranates growing in the Geokchai district, are most often used for juice production.
Geokchai pomegranates have got an international recognition and became a synonym of "the true Azerbaijani pomegranates». The secret of magnificent taste and guaranteed quality of the Geokchai pomegranates is a unique area microclimate and soil composition, which is not seen anywhere else in the world.
New life of pomegranate juice
Newspapers wrote
Since long, local residents squeezed juice from pomegranates, but in the absence of conditions for storage they were forced to extract juice concentrate by boiling and use as a sauce, now widely known as «narsharab».
The modern history of pomegranate juice has begun in the sixties past century, when a factory to produce tinned fruit juice was set up on the basis of an inter-district procurement agency in the Geokchai district of the Azerbaijani Soviet Socialist Republic. Its founder and the first director was Timur Faradzh ogly Akhmedov, who has filled his name in many nice pages in the history of the republican agriculture, having laid the basis of fruit juices production in Azerbaijan. Starting with apple and tomato juice, he was the first to suggest to process pomegranate and quince, and in 1978 his factory was awarded with a medal at the “Erfrut-78” International exhibition (Germany) for the pomegranate juice. Timur Akhmedov was a true patriot of the land and its ruby pomegranates, he had a dream that people everywhere in the country - and all over the world would get to know and love the taste of pomegranate juice. His efforts has helped creating new specialized pomegranate state farms, old pomegranates plantations were extended and new ones were set to cultivate the best selection brands of pomegranates, which has served as an impulse for wider cultivation of pomegranates both in Geokchai, and in the adjacent areas.
By 1984, the factory products were already supplied to all republics and regions of the USSR and many countries of the world, winning prestigious awards at the largest international contests.
Revival of traditions
The collapse of the USSR and subsequent general slump in production has affected the Geokchai factory, too. However, in the beginning of 2006, the worthy son of his father and known politician and businessman, Farkhad Timurovich Akhmedov, has continued the good family tradition having bought out the factory with the purpose to bring back to the factory its reputed name and restore the popularity of its products.
The aim was not just to restore the factory, but to plant new pomegranate gardens in place of neglected or cut down plantations. An investment program of the branch revival has been developed under new management. The program meant radical reconstruction of the enterprise on the basis of the most advanced technologies and restoration of legendary pomegranate plantations. In 2007, the factory had purchased modern technological lines of leading European companies: Bertucci (Italy), Rieckermann and Schmidt (Germany), thus providing a complete computerized complex for production of natural and concentrated juice meeting to the highest branch, technological and sanitary-and-hygienic standards.
Ii near-term plans, foresees to lay down new pomegranate plantations, and further introduce new technologies, raise the quality and extend the assortment of finished products.
Still the main goal remains the same: due to modern sparing technologies, to convey carefully to end users an untouched unique taste and the most valuable natural properties of juice of the legendary Azerbaijani pomegranates – that was a dream of - Timur Faradzh ogly Akhmedov.
