The olive harvest: a season of work, family and access

A crop at the centre of the farmed landscape

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) describes the annual olive harvest as an economic, social and cultural event of central importance for Palestinians. In its November 2017 bulletin, OCHA reported more than 10 million olive trees cultivated on about 86,000 hectares in the West Bank — 47 per cent of the territory's cultivated agricultural area — with production concentrated in the north and north-west. ¹

The same OCHA bulletin said between 80,000 and 100,000 families were reported to rely on olives and olive oil for primary or secondary income, that the sector employed more than 15 per cent of working women, and that the olive sub-sector — oil, table olives, pickles and soap — was worth between $160 million and $191 million in good years. These are dated figures from 2017; we cite them as such rather than as current estimates. ¹

From grove to press

An earlier OCHA report from October 2008 set out the chain that follows picking: about 93 per cent of the harvest went to olive oil, with the remainder used for pickles, table olives and soap; fresh olives had to reach one of roughly 270 licensed commercial presses quickly, because delay reduces oil quality; and most production was consumed domestically, with a small export trade, principally to Jordan. ²

That timing is why access matters so much. A grove that can be reached only on a few permitted days, or a press that cannot be reached promptly, affects both the quantity and the quality of a family's oil. ²

Access as a recurring constraint

OCHA's reporting over many seasons identifies the same categories of difficulty: groves behind the West Bank Barrier in the so-called “Seam Zone”, land close to the Barrier, and land near Israeli settlements, where farmers have traditionally needed scheduled Israeli military permission, described as “prior coordination,” to reach their trees. ³

For the 2023 season, which coincided with the 7 October attack on Israel and the escalation of hostilities in Gaza, OCHA reported that Israeli authorities cancelled almost all prior-coordination approvals, that agricultural gates along the Barrier remained overwhelmingly closed, and that more than 96,000 dunums of olive-cultivated land were left unharvested. OCHA's 2017 bulletin had likewise recorded theft of and damage to trees and intimidation of farmers during the harvest. ^{3 1}

A landscape recognised as heritage

The olive is also part of a recognised cultural landscape. In 2014 UNESCO inscribed “Palestine: Land of Olives and Vines – Cultural Landscape of Southern Jerusalem, Battir” on the World Heritage List, citing terraced hillsides, dry-stone walls and a spring-fed irrigation system, and placed it on the List of World Heritage in Danger at the same session. ⁴

The harvest is tied to the table as well. Musakhan — chicken roasted with onions, sumac and olive oil on taboon bread — is widely associated with the olive season and the northern West Bank, and is traditionally timed to the new oil. ⁵

What this feature does not claim

This is a desk-researched explainer drawn from the documents listed below. Curated Humanity did not visit groves or interview farmers for it, and it does not estimate this year's harvest. For current-season reporting, see the attributed coverage in our news feed.