Dates festival to boost cultural, heritage awareness of Omanis

Energy Saturday 22/October/2016 20:02 PM
By: Times News Service
Dates festival to boost cultural, heritage awareness of Omanis

Muscat: A dates festival is being organised from today to enhance cultural and heritage awareness of the status of date palms for the Omanis. Activities of the 4th Omani Dates Festival, namely ‘Dates Industry Development’ seminar, will begin at the Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque in the Wilayat of Bausher under the patronage of Dr. Fu’ad bin Ja’afar Al Sajwani, Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries. The seminar will be organised by the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, in collaboration with the Public Authority for SMEs Development “Riyada”. The seminar will discuss the role of public organisations in developing data palm sector and presenting some successful experiences. It will also highlight funding provided by Oman Development Bank (ODB) to dates processing factories and the premium marketing outlets project, which is funded by the Agriculture and Fisheries Development Fund. The stamp of the fourth Omani Dates Festival will be also launched during the event, in collaboration with Oman Post. The 4th Omani Dates Festival, which will continue until October 31, aims at highlighting the nutritional and health values of the Omani dates. It also seeks to enhance cultural and heritage awareness of the status of date palms for the Omani man. The festival also aims at enhancing competition among farmers in caring for date palm trees and encouraging investment in the field to increase local production and improve the quality. The festival also seeks to market date palm products in a bid to increase income of farmers and contribute to the growth of the national economy. The major event of the festival will be the Omani Dates Market, which will be opened at Hail Farq in the Wilayat of Nizwa on October 26 under the auspices of Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdullah bin Zahir Al Hinai, State Advisor. The six-day long market will showcase the main types of dates. As more than 56 farmers, dates processing factories and dates units, in addition to the Public Authority for Craft Industries (PACI) will take part at the market.