MAKKAH: For decades, the Taif rose was a symbol: A fragrant shrub bound to the name of Taif, sold fresh and admired for a few weeks each spring. It is now also a manufacturing base.
Processing plants have extended the flower’s commercial life across the whole year, creating an economic and tourism asset for the region and binding two groups of businesses together, the farmers who grow the petals and the manufacturers who distil them, harnessing modern equipment to draw out perfume and cosmetic ingredients.
Rashid Al-Qurashi, one of the largest rose growers in Taif, told Arab News the crop rewards inherited expertise and year-round attention, all geared toward a picking window of about 45 days.
The cultivation calendar, as he described it, begins with winter pruning, then steady irrigation and soil care, and ending with the harvest itself carried out in the dark hours before dawn, when the flower’s oils remain most concentrated.
Growers expand their acreage each year out of attachment to the plant as much as commercial logic, he said. Demand has risen annually as the rose’s reputation has spread internationally, encouraging farmers to increase output and to support processing so that supply is no longer limited to the harvest season.
