Toros Agri Industry and Trade Co. Inc. was established to transfer Tekfen’s sectorial know-how and experience to the agricultural sector.

The land near Sarımazı Village at 28 km distance to Ceyhan, where Toros Agri’s first fertilizer plant shall be built, was acquired. The proximity of this region to two important agricultural centers in Turkey, Çukurova and GAP, has been effective in the selection of the location. The construction of the plant started in 1978.

Ceyhan Fertilizer Plant has started its operations. The opening ceremony took place with the participation of Vice Prime Minister Turgut Özal and Industry and Technology Minister Şahap Kocatopçu. The factory was to produce 130 thousand tons of Monoamonium Phosphate (MAP) and 330 thousand tons of compound fertilizer (NPK).

Toros International Transport & Maritime Co. Inc. has been founded. Toros Alize, a cargo vessel, was purchased to transport raw materials.

The state control over fertilizers was abolished by the government and the fertilizer market was liberalized. Fertilizer producers were granted the right to perform their own marketing activities and set sales prices. Toros Agri, which adapted rapidly to the new market conditions, leaped forward by establishing an efficient retailer and logistics infrastructure reaching all around Turkey. The company also doubled its production and storage capacity with its expansion investment at Ceyhan facility in the same year. Following the acquisition of a bag production plant at Adana, Toros started to produce its own bag.

The first mobile bagging units started their operations. This enabled the company to transfort bulk fertilizer to different ports of Turkey and distribute it to nearby regions by using on-site bagging facilities. Such innovative practices helped Toros rapidly increase its market share.

Toros increased it annual production capacity to 1.5 million tons by acquiring Akdeniz Gübre at Mersin and became the largest fertilizer producer in Turkey. Being the smallest company in the sector at the beginning, Toros Agri became the market leader in less than 10 years.

A second pier was constructed in the Ceyhan Plant due to the growing port operations provided to third parties. Designed as a multi-purpose terminal, Toros Terminal has become one of the most important ports of Eastern Mediterranean in terms of capacity and equipment.

Erhan Öner, the Chairman of Toros Agri, was elected as the President of International Fertilizer Industry Association - IFA. Toros also hosted the 62. IFA Annual Meeting at İstanbul in 1994.

Toros Agri has commenced zinc enriched fertilizer production for the first time in the world. The success in enriching micronutrient deficient soils with zinc, which is highly beneficial for human health and agricultural fertility, has been internationally acknowledged. Zinc fertilizer production was programmed in many countries all-over the world in the later years.

Toros Agri High School built in Ceyhan opened its doors to students with its 30 classrooms. In the following year Toros Primary School built at Kurtpınarı village went into service.

Toros founded Hazera-Toros Seeds Inc. in 1998 to offer high quality seeds to farmers. Crop seed sales started in 1999 under the name Hazera. The partnership ended in 2004 and Toros continued its operations in the seed sector alone after this date. In the same year, Toros Adana Yumurtalık Free Zone (TAYSEB) commenced its operations.

As a part of the expansion plan regarding other agricultural inputs beside fertilizer, Hishtil-Toros Seedlings Inc. was established in 1999. The company produced 48 million seedlings in its first year of operation.

Toros started crop seed operations through contracted production of Adana-99, a wheat variety developed by Çukurova Agricultural Research Institute under Ministry of Agriculture and General Directorate of Agricultural Enterprises (TIGEM), the greatest seed producing body of Turkey. Later, Osmaniyem and Karatopak varieties have been added to the portfolio of Toros Agri.

In order to conduct studies on productive and disease-free seed varieties, Seed Research and Development Station was established over a 40,000 square meters area in Çandır, Antalya. In the same year, the techno-agriculture applications centre, Agripark, joined the group. Producing disease-free seeds and fruit saplings through tissue culture techniques, Agripark has made significant contribution to the Turkish agriculture since its foundation.

Toros Agri strengthened its leadership in fertilizer sector by acquiring Samsun Gübre. Following the completion of the acquisition, a large scale renovation project was realized and the plant recommenced production in 2006. With the participation of Samsun Plant, the production capacity of Toros Agri reached 38% of the total fertilizer production capacity in Turkey.

A book named “Fertiliy Pouring on Soil” was published on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of Toros Agri’s operations. The establishment and development stories of Toros Agri were collected in the book.

As part of 30th anniversary celebrations, an eight-part documentary named “The Mother Soil” was also prepared. Aimed to raise awareness of farmers on fundamental issues and filmed after a 9-months work at various regions of Turkey, the documentary reached a wide audience throughout Turkey by means of İZ TV and local channels.

Toros Agri and OCP, the largest enterprise of Morocco and leader of the global phosphate market, jointly established Black Sea Fertilizer Trading Co. in order to sell phosphate fertilizers produced at the Samsun Plant to the countries around Black Sea, Balkans and Central Asia. In the same year, Toros Agri CEO Esin Mete was awarded the Royal Medal by the Moroccan King VI. Mohammed.

Toros Agri built an underground cold-storage warehouse at Nevşehir to store the potato seeds.

Toros Agri CEO Esin Mete was elected as the President of International Fertilizer Industry Association - IFA. Mete was the second Toros Agri executive appointed to this position after Erhan Öner in 1993. Following 2-year term, Esin Mete handed over her assignment to the new president at the 83th Annual Conference of IFA held in İstanbul in 2015.

Toros Agri started to support the Seasonal Agricultural Workers’ Health Development Programme conducted by Harran University and United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Turkey.

The new USD 335 million investment at the Samsun Plant in order to reduce the company’s import dependency for raw material supply was put into operation in 2015. The investment covers establishment of a new plant for production of sulphuric acid, increasing capacity of the existing phosphoric acid unit and rehabilitation of the compound fertilizer (NPK) plant. The new environment-friendly facility converts the heat energy emitted during sulphuric acid reaction into electricity.