How a Turkish flour mill was rebuilt after the Turkish-Syrian earthquake

This story was produced by our colleagues at the BBC.

Merbe Flour Mill in Turkey is once again a hive of activity, but it has been a long way to get here.

“We have been through very difficult things under very difficult circumstances,” said Ali Emirogal, who founded this company nearly a quarter of a century ago.

Ali Amirogul from Mirbey Company fills a bag of flour and checks the quality on the production line. (Victoria Craig/Marketplace)

The company has gone through difficult times – including persistently high inflation rates and currency crises. But nothing prepared him for February 6, 2023, when earthquakes hit Turkey and Syria. The toll was staggering, with an estimated 55,000 people killed. The total economic costs of the disaster are approximately $84 billion.

“The machines inside the factory moved from their places. “The engines were severely damaged,” Amirogl said. “The Ministry of Industry came to conduct an inspection, and its assessment showed that the damage to the factory was estimated at approximately $2 million.”

This included a collapsed roof, raw materials destroyed by heavy rains, and the theft of products in the immediate aftermath of the earthquakes.

For more than two months, Emir Oğl lived in the factory. Many of his workers, including Solomon Blair, have returned to help with repairs to get production back up and running as quickly as possible.

“We did major renovations with Ali, working side by side day and night,” he said. “Ali took care of our children, our house and our money in the best possible way. Our children did not go hungry.”

To help with repairs, Amirugel discovered a loan program for businesses in 11 earthquake-affected provinces in Turkey. The US government's International Development Finance Corporation provided a seven-year, $100 million loan to Turkish Sekerbank to support small and medium-sized businesses in the region. The Sugar Bank added its own contribution, increasing available funds to $133 million.

“In the next three or five years, there will definitely be a greater need,” said Murat Özdama, regional director of Şekerbank in Antakya. “This is a very limited budget, but we will provide more. We are really trying to make it available as quickly as possible.”

Merbe's Amerogel said the US-Sekerbank loan was very helpful. Not only was he able to repair the roof of his house, but he explained that his mill is one of the only mills that has resumed production out of about a dozen mills in the area.

A bag of merpe flour is used to make lava, a special flatbread in Türkiye. (Victoria Craig/Marketplace)

“We need to expand more to encourage our people to return to Hatay,” he added. “We need to increase capacity in the next five years to meet growing demand.”

Emir Oğl said he is slowly expanding his business by using parts of the wheat crop discarded to produce flour to make livestock feed. Not only does it ensure that he will be able to stay in business, but his neighbors will be able to thrive again, too, he said.

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