“The establishment of an orchard deserves planning and preparation and the seedlings need to be carefully selected to ensure good production,” said Charbel Hobeika, a technical expert leading a training organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in Lebanon.

Under the framework of the FAO project “Promotion of Agricultural Livelihoods and Employment through Investment in Land Reclamation and Water Reservoirs” funded by the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the training took place in December 2019 and January 2020 as part of a capacity-building exercise for the benefit of the Green Plan (GP) staff. In fact, the GP staff are in direct contact with GP beneficiaries investing in land reclamation, 90% of whom opt to plant fruit trees on their lands. Eleven men and nine women participants were trained on orchard establishment, varieties and rootstocks selection for a number of main fruit species planted in Lebanon, in addition to estimating the costs and revenues of such investments.

In order to sustain rural communities and to reduce rural exodus, the Lebanese Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) through its affiliated Green Plan (GP), launched in 1963 a demand-driven support program allowing farmers to benefit from subsidies to invest in agriculture infrastructure including land reclamation for agriculture, soil and water conservation, planting of fruit trees, and other complementary works. The GP program has empowered a large number of farmers to invest in reclaiming their abandoned lands or rehabilitating/upgrading low-productivity lands.

“The training enabled us to acquire new concepts we didn’t learn in the technical school”, said Samah Badra from the North Bekaa office. For engineer Bassam Harb, the training is important to his work as it highlights important tips and guidelines to support the farmers.

The trainer shared practical demonstrations of orchards newly established using intensive systems, and of training and pruning of trees, removing weak crotch angles and tip-pruning long branches throughout the seasons in an interesting video. “The trainer is multidisciplinary. The training is well prepared and is based on demand from GP” said Georges Chemaly, Head of Mount Lebanon One regional office,  adding “we can now better speak the farmer’s language”. 

“I am eager to take part in the demonstration field days,” said Zeinab Zahraman, from the North Lebanon regional office who found the training very useful.

 This training session will be complemented in January and February 2020 with a tour of orchards where different orchards are newly established and a number of varieties are grown.