Photos: Egypt's blossoming trade in fragrant jasmine flowers

At midnight, Eman Mehanna switches on her headlamp and begins her day's work picking jasmine flowers, as their powerful fragrance wafts far across the fields in Egypt's fertile Nile Delta.

Egypt's Gharbiya region is the heartland of its jasmine harvest. The aromatic oils extracted for perfumes from here make up over half the global supply, according to international trade figures. | Above: A worker holds on her head a wicker basket filled with harvested jasmine flowers in a field at the village of Shubra Beloula in Egypt's northern Nile delta province of Gharbiya.

"We have been picking jasmine since we were children," Mehanna said, gathering blossoms by hand in the village of Shubra Beloula, around 100 kilometres (60 miles) north of the capital Cairo. | Above: Workers unload baskets filled with harvested jasmine flowers at a warehouse in the village of Shubra Beloula.

The white petals, plucked from densely-packed rows of chest-high green bushes of "royal jasmine" - Jasminum grandiflorum - burst out of her wicker basket. During the harvest season from June until November, picking begins around midnight and finishes a few hours after dawn each day.

It is a tough job, but a hard-working picker can harvest as much as five kilogrammes of petals a day. While it is cooler to work after dark, the key reason harvesting is done at night is because it is only then that the flowers fully open.

"You really need to concentrate on looking for the blossoming flowers," Mehanna said. "We leave the closed ones for the following day." After dawn, she swaps her headlight for a hat to shade her from the burning sun.

Egypt and India dominate the production of jasmine extract for perfumes, making up around 95 percent of supply, according to the International Federation of Essential Oils and Aroma Trades (IFEAT).

Egyptian farmers have long complained that the low production costs of their big rival India drive their prices down. But the economic impact of the novel coronavirus pandemic has been harder still, with demand dropping sharply, farmers said.

Jasmine trade is estimated to pull in some $6.5 million annually for Egypt, providing income to around 50,000 people, IFEAT says.

In Egypt, more than 90 percent of jasmine fields are in Gharbiya governorate, fed by the rich minerals and waters of the Nile, shortly before the river reaches the Mediterranean Sea. | Above: Workers stand by baskets filled with harvested jasmine flowers at a warehouse in the village of Shubra Beloula.