The Palestinian Ministry of Agriculture estimates that the damage to agriculture in the territories from the outbreak of the al-Aqsa Intifada to the end of January totaled $157 million.
A report distributed by the Ministry’s emergency committee, set up to assess damage to the sector, claims that Israel caused infrastructure damage to farmers in Palestinian Authority territories totaling $50 million through the felling of 180,000 fruit trees, mainly olive, citrus, almond, date trees and grape vines. The report also claims that nurseries and agricultural equipment, such as irrigation networks and water wells, have been destroyed. The report states that 1,750 farmers have been affected by these moves.
Palestinian Minister of Agriculture Hikmat Zeid told “Globes”, “Felling trees is tantamount to perpetrating war crimes. There is no security justification for harming flaura or destroying agricultural land and the Israeli people must take a firm stand against this policy, which leads to ecological damage to both parties.”
Zeid accuses Israel of paralyzing the passage of agricultural produce between Palestinian towns, due to traffic restrictions, which is also disrupting agricultural exports and causing dumping in local markets, resulting in drastically reduced prices.
According to Zeid, the Palestinians export close to 450 tons daily of agricultural produce in this season, at an average price of $250 a ton. The Palestinians also export strawberries and flowers from Gaza to Europe via Agrexco (Israel’s agricultural export board) and vegetables and citrus fruits to the Gulf States, Saudia Arabia, and Jordan. Being forced to sell export-designated produce on the local market is causing losses of more than $100 a ton.
Zeid adds that even when Israel allows these exports, they are shipped in Israeli trucks only, since Palestinian Authority trucks are no longer permitted to enter Israel, which substantially raises the transportation costs and delays the produce’s departure, often leading to its disqualification for export.
”The produce cannot be transported from one town to another and certainly not to Israel, with new road blocks constantly being closed,” Zeid says. “The security checks are meticulous and slow, and the waiting produce gets destroyed. Beforehand, driving a truck from Rafiah to Tel Aviv took several hours, whereas it now has to wait a whole day at the road block for the slow security check and ultimately, the produce is transferred to an Israeli truck.”
Published by Israel's Business Arena on 22 February, 2001