The Palestinian farmer Ali Abu Sitta said that he expects a promising season of olive harvest this year compared to the previous season following abundance in rainfall last winter.
“The number of olive trees is increasing every year in Palestine and there is a growing interest in developing the olive sector” Abu Sitta said.
However he added these blessed trees are no longer getting enough attention. Many people take care of their olive trees in the harvest season but they are treated as wild trees during the rest of the year.
“When you give the olive tree it gives back but when you neglect it don’t expect much from it. Our parents treated olive trees as family members” Abu Sitta told the PIC reporter.
The Palestinian Ministry of Agriculture three weeks ahead of the start of the olive harvest season has published a study underlying the losses caused by the premature picking of olives.
According to the study in light of a survey carried out by the Ministry of Agriculture over the past years about 2500 tons of olive oil valued at $18 million are lost in olive oil pomace annually.
It pointed out that this amount is wasted every year because there is no equipment in Palestine to extract oil from the pomace due to high cost.
It explained that the main reason for this loss of oil is the early picking of olives. Olive presses have less efficiency when the fruits are solid and immature.
The Ministry called on the Palestinian farmers not to rush the harvesting of olive fruits this season which are expected to take a longer time to ripen due to the late blooming and budding as well as the weather conditions during summer.
Promising season
Fayyad Fayyad head of the Palestinian Olive Oil Council said that the olive oil season this year is expected to be similar to the 2004 season when Palestine produced 30000 tons of olive oil.
Fayyad told the PIC reporter that in 2004 as a result of abundant production olive oil prices collapsed yet that will not be the case this season because of the different marketing outlets and the modern oil storage methods.
The Palestinian farmers’ skills and capabilities have been significantly improved over the past years too he confirmed.
In addition to this he noted we are welcoming the new olive season with no olive oil in the stores from the previous season while in 2004 we entered the olive season with over 10000 tons in the stores.
Although the olive oil production is one of the most ancient industries in Palestine Fayyad said Palestine still lags behind the olive oil-producing countries in the Middle East for many reasons.
For example he explained “Palestine is the only country which still uses plastic bottles to store oil which is very bad.”
