Despite shelling, Syria Farmers pick their olives

Despite the explosive barrels and shelling, farmers in Syrian north keep going to the olive fields to harvest what has left, then to take it to the oil-press.

“Last year almost all of us left the village frightened of shelling and bombing with explosive barrels, which prevented me from harvesting the olive, however, this year we have no choice but to stick to our source of living”, Abu Mahmood, a farmer from Termanin village told “Eqtsad”

He added that last year, olive oil's prices have dropped despite the crazy increase in prices in general, but this year, prices have got better.

Abu Khalid, an agent who facilitate providing workers for harvesting olive, said to Eqtsad: “I have more than 30 workers, we help farmers in harvesting their products, usually we manage to harvest more than 20 field a year”

He explained that wages have increased this year compared to last year, as a daily wage can reach to S.P 500-700.

Abu Mohamed, who has an oil-press in Northern Syria, explained to Eqtsad: “there is no doubt that productivity have fallen down as a result of using large area of agricultural land for camps or other charity programs."

He added that his oil-press produces now around 3 thousands tons, which is better than before, and he explained the reason behind that was the destruction of many oil-press around.

“It worth mentioning that some Kurd groups, including PKK, have occupied wide area of farmers’ lands and prevented them from reaching to them to harvest their products, according to Mohammed.S, the agricultural Engineer.

The Engineer explained that people in Efrin and it countryside live in an extremely difficult situation, where they are prevented from reaching to their land by PKK, and they cannot leave to Turkey frightened of Turkish snipers, besides being a target for extremists in nearby countries.

This post first appeared at Eqtsad, Zaman Alwasl Business online; Translation by Yusra Ahmed