Silal officially opens

Staff Reporter

Barka, Dec 4

The Central Fruits and Vegetables Market Silal in the Wilayat of Barka was officially opened under the auspices of Dr Said bin Mohammed al Saqri, Minister of Economy, on Wednesday. Silal Market is a national and international marketplace for trading vegetables and fruits and a marketing outlet for home-grown agricultural products by agricultural firms and individual farmers.

The project implementation took over four years starting from the planning stage back in 2020, then designing the general plan, signing an agreement for shifting storage and wholesale facilities from the Mawaleh Central Fruits and Vegetables Market to the new market located in Khazaen Economic City in May 2021. The construction work began in May 2022 leading and commercial operations commenced in June this year 2024. Khalid al Khatib, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the (Silal), said: “We commend the efforts undertaken by the government, civil and private institutions, as well as companies affiliated with the Oman Investment Authority (OIA) to implement this project.

The Silal market is the outcome of joint efforts made by the Oman Infrastructure Investment Fund (Rakiza) owned by OIA with a 60 per cent share, Salem and Partners (25 per cent), Khazna Logistics with (10 per cent) and Al Kalbani International Investment (5 per cent).” Othman bin Ali al Hattali, Operations Manager at Silal Market, said: “We are realy proud of the market’s modern, integrated facilities that are designed and implemented according to the highest international specifications and standards. The market has central cooling areas, a wholesale market, dry warehouses, sorting and packaging workshops, a customs inspection platform, agricultural quarantine, a food safety laboratory, stalls for selling and marketing local products, administrative offices for wholesalers as well as other service facilities.

Since the start of the trial operation in the market at the end of June this year, the single inspection station has been able to deal with more than 7,000 trucks from different countries of origin, and the market received more than 800 local trucks daily from governorates and wilayats of the Sultanate of Oman. The market is visited by about 5,000 people daily.”

The daily trading volume at Silal Market exceeds 5,000 tonnes of local and imported vegetables and fruits with a loss rate of less than 5 per cent thanks the the market’s efficient cooling system. Silal Market provides more than 300 direct jobs for nationals as well as 450 indirect jobs. Al Hattali said.