Türkiye plans to open three additional boron processing plants, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan told a mass inauguration ceremony in Eskişehir province on Tuesday.

"This year, we will add three new boron processing plants to Eskişehir, which account for an investment value of 501 million liras ($25.8 million)," Erdoğan said.

He said the "pilot facility" opened in Eskişehir will begin processing 1,200 tons of ore per year in the first stage establishing another "facility that will increase the annual production to 570,000 tons immediately."

Erdoğan said the "design, manufacture and assembly of the locomotive and subsystems of the first domestic electric locomotive, E5000, will be completed and then, testing and certification will be launched."

"Here, we will manufacture 500 locomotives that Türkiye will need in the next 10 years," he added.

Türkiye’s exports of boron and related products hit an all-time high last year, as the country revved up efforts to benefit more from its vast reserves of the key material.

Türkiye has been seeking to boost its value-added products, and has been processing more boron and producing semi-finished and finished products instead of selling directly after extraction, which was the case in previous years.

The element is actively used in many areas including technology, energy, cleaning materials, defense, glass and ceramics.