Abu Dhabi: The winners for one of the main competitions at this year’s Liwa Date Festival were announced on Tuesday night, with a grand prize worth Dh125,000 awarded for the winner who came first for the best date type.
The 11th Liwa Date Festival has been the biggest so far according to organisers, with the festival growing in stature both regionally, and worldwide as one of the main showcases when it comes to dates.
Mohammad Saeed Al Merar, picked up the first prize for the best produced khalas dates, one of the most popular and well-known produced dates in the region.
Dr Samir Al Shakir, one of the main judges for the competition, told Gulf News that the dates are put through a rigorous judging process before the winner is announced, “The first samples given to us by the farmers are graded out of 50 per cent, and we have a criteria that we use to grade and score the dates that are given to us. This criteria starts by checking the degree of infection and how clean the date is. Next we check the homogeneity and ripening of the date, as well as how big it is and how much it weighs along with many other factors.”
“This first process allows us to get rid of the dates that are not good enough, and then we keep the top 20. The top 20 that we keep are the ones that are submitted for the competition, and they are judged out of 100 per cent,” he added.
The judging process includes visits to the farms to make sure the samples provided are from the farm itself, and not from another source.
“We go and visit the contestants’ farms, to be sure that those samples are from their farm. We also go to their farm to see their irrigation, how clean the farm is, and if they are following the correct procedures in looking after their farm.” Dr Al Shakir said.
The number of participants who took part in this year’s competition for best khalas dates was estimated at more than 400 according to Dr Al Shakir, who went on to say the competition gets bigger every year, and that one of the main aims behind the festival is to have farmers put more time and effort into looking after their farms.
