Samsun

Samsun exists because the Black Sea needed a port for tobacco. This city on Turkey's northern coast became what Charleston was to cotton or Liverpool to slave trade goods—the chokepoint where a fertile hinterland's production funneled into maritime commerce. The Samsun-Bafra tobacco variety, grown in surrounding valleys, commanded premium prices and built the city.

The Yeşilırmak River, flowing 519 kilometers from Sivas Province, deposited nutrient-rich silt across alluvial plains ideal for tobacco cultivation. By the late 19th century, British traders noted the tobacco's "small but very aromatic leaves" and paid accordingly. The city grew with the crop, and the port grew with the city. A former tobacco factory in the city center now operates as a shopping mall—the clearest possible monument to economic succession.

Modern Samsun metabolizes through its port: flour mills import Ukrainian wheat and re-export processed goods; manufacturers produce medical devices, furniture (wood imported across the Black Sea), chemicals, and automotive parts. The province's 1.35 million people increasingly cluster in the metropolitan area, drawn by port-related industries and urban services. Rural-to-urban migration has accelerated as the port's role in logistics expands.

Samsun holds special significance as the place where Mustafa Kemal Atatürk landed in 1919 to begin the Turkish War of Independence. By 2026, the city faces familiar questions: government limits on tobacco farming have ended the monoculture era, and Samsun's future depends on whether its port can capture Black Sea trade flows that shift as Ukraine, Russia, and Turkey's relationships evolve.