Despite high temperature, evaporation, and low rainfall (Figure 5.1), the Jericho district is distinguished for its agricultural activities. The success of agriculture in the area is related to the combination of its location below sea level, year-round warm weather and the availability of water (from springs and wells).

Figure 5.1 Average distribution of rainfall and temperatures in the Jericho district for (1983-1992)

The warm winter temperature helps in cultivating vegetable crops which would not be possible during this season in other parts of Palestine, the Middle East and Europe. Thus, agriculture in the Jericho district has a high economic potential both in the local and export markets. Tropical crops are also possible, increasing the diversity of agriculture in Palestine.

The Jericho district has three main agrarian regions: Jericho city, Dyouk and Nuwe'ma, and Al-Auja (Jericho Agricultural Station, 1994). All plantations are irrigated from agricultural wells and springs located at the district.

Plant Production

The area cultivated by Palestinians has not been expanded during the last 20 years due to the restrictions imposed by the Israeli occupation authorities on the land and amount of water permitted to be pumped from each agricultural well.

In the 1993/94 growing season, the agricultural area in the district was approximately 2419.4 hectares (Jericho Agricultural station, 1994), forming nearly 43% of the total irrigated agricultural area in the Palestinian part of the Jordan Valley and 23% of this area in the West Bank (SAAR, 1992). Of the three agrarian regions, Jericho city has the largest agricultural area while Dyouk and Nuwe'ma have the lowest. Table 5.1 shows the distribution of agricultural areas in the district.

The main cultivated crops in the Jericho district are vegetables including melons, fruit trees and field crops and forages. The area and the total production of each crop are shown in Figure 5.2.

Figure 5.2: Total cultivated area and production of different cropping patterns in the Jericho district for the 1993/94 growing season.

Vegetables

About 28 vegetable crops are grown throughout the Jericho district over an area of 1503.8 hectares and under different types of cropping systems. This area is calculated on the basis of effective plantation per hectare. Cropping systems are divided as: irrigated open field; low tunnels (crops grown under low plastic tunnels of 80 cm in height, usually used for early plantations to protect the crops from low temperatures during winter); medium and high tunnels (2-3.5 m in height); and plastic houses (more than 3.5 m in height) (Jericho Agricultural Station, 1994).

Due to water resource limitations in the district, most vegetable crops are irrigated using drip systems. Sprinklers and traditional flooding are also used in limited areas, especially in the basins cultivated with crops such as spinach, parsley and citrus.

The cropping season usually extends from September through June. During the rest of the year, land is being prepared for the coming season. Obviously, this pattern varies depending on the cropping system, the crop, the needs of the land and the weather in a given year.

The planting dates in the Jericho district fall in two long periods, from September until January for early and winter cropping, and from February to April for summer cropping. Farmers often plant some of the plots with short life cycle crops, so that they can cultivate a second summer crop, resulting in an increase in the effective cultivated area. Recognizing the possibilities for increasing production through the intensification of agricultural techniques, farmers and business people have introduced modern technologies such as: plastic houses, high tunnels, low tunnels, plastic mulches, drip irrigation, improved varieties of plants and chemicals such as pesticides and hormones. The combination of these have resulted in an increase in crop production, especially for prostrate varieties (i.e. cucumbers and tomatoes). On the other hand, enlarging the vegetative cover per area has increased the water requirements where other alternatives of water resources should be found.

Of the total cultivated vegetables, tomato, squash, Jews mallow, cucumber, eggplant and sweet corn have the largest areas and production, comprising about 71.6% of the areas and 73.6% of production (see Figure 5.3).

Figure 5.3: Total area and production of vegetable crops under different cropping systems in the Jericho district for the 1993/94 growing season

Plastic houses and high tunnels cover up to 6.2 hectares, and are used to produce sweet and hot peppers, tomato, beans, cucumber, eggplant and Jews mallow. Low plastic tunnels, occupying around 161.2 hectares, and are used to plant the same types of vegetables planted in the open field irrigated areas, including all the 28 vegetable crops.

The intensive irrigated vegetable production requires a continuous work during all stages of the growing season, providing more employment opportunities for the people. Usually, farmers in the Jericho district tend not to own the land they cultivate but they always work through share-cropping or renting arrangements. This is due both to the unpredictability of the produce market, making the farmers wary of investment in land, and also to the traditional land ownership arrangements.

Photo 3: Cultivation using low plastic tunnels in the Jericho district

Field crops and forages

All kinds of field crops and forages in the Jericho district are cultivated under irrigated conditions where sprinkler irrigation is commonly used. High productivity is obtained from this cultivation, especially when compared with the same crops grown under rainfed conditions in other areas of the West Bank, especially the southern parts where there is limited annual rainfall.

Wheat and barley are the main cultivated field crops covering an area of 106.5 hectares in the Jericho district. Green forages, such as alfalfa and Egyptian clover cover an area of 36 hectares, with an average production of 20 tons per hectare (Figure 5.4). This area should be increased especially with forage varieties that can withstand salinity. Increasing forage production will supply fodder to the livestock sector and reduce the dependency on Israeli green forages. Most of these forages are also good for improving soil quality.

Figure 5.4: Total area and production of field crops and forages in the Jericho district for the 1993/94 growing season

Fruit trees

Seven different types of fruit trees are cultivated on an area of 771.1 hectares in the Jericho district with an average total production of 21,065.8 tons in the 1993/1994 growing season (see Figure 5.5) (Jericho Agricultural Station, 1994).

Figure 5.5: Total area and production of different fruit trees in the Jericho district for the 1993/94 growing season.

Bananas have the largest cultivated area of all fruit trees comprising 72.6%, and making up 79.8% of the total fruit production in weight. The banana is a profitable crop, both in terms of production and net revenue, but it requires large amounts of water, up to 17,000 CM/yr/hectare.

There are 6 cultivated types of citrus trees, totaling 17.8% of the fruit trees area and nearly 15.5% of fruit production (see Figure 5.6). Oranges have five different varieties (Joint, Valencia, local or Baladi, French, Shamoti), making up about 50% of the citrus area and 40% of its production. Shamoti oranges and lemons cover the largest area of citrus and produce about 20 and 30 tons per hectare respectively. However, the decrease in the economic value of citrus, especially for oranges, have led some farmers to cut down the citrus trees, replacing them with vegetables, and bananas. The remaining 74.2 hectares of fruit trees are devoted to date palms (57 hectares), grapes, olives, and loquats (Figure 5.5).

Figure 5.6 Total area and production of citrus trees in the Jericho district for the 1993/94 growing season.

Drip irrigation is the main system used for irrigating all types of orchards except for citrus trees. Citrus are mainly irrigated through basins, which uses more water than other methods of irrigation.

Crop Water Requirements

Crop water requirements vary from season to season depending on the amount of rainfall and planting date. Low rainfall, high rates of evaporation, transpiration and radiation, low relative humidity and relatively high soil salinity in the Jericho district make the crop water requirements higher than other districts in the West Bank.

Calculating water requirements for different cultivated crops give a realistic estimation of the total water consumption for the cultivated area. It also helps in projecting and planning the potential for the expansion of irrigated agriculture and modeling the types of crops to be grown, taking into consideration the amounts of available water and its sources.

There are many factors controlling the water required by the plant through its life cycle such as:

1. Climatic factors such as relative humidity, temperature, sunshine or radiation, rainfall and wind speed.
2. Soil factors such as the soil physical characteristics, water potential and hydraulic conductivity.
3. Plant factors such as the planting date, growth stage, type, the size (coverage percent), the leaf orientation and the stomata numbers (Najem & Badir, 1980).

The crop Zwater requirements based on water evaporation from the soil and transpiration of the plant are also calculated (Doneen & Westcot, 1988).

Several methods are used for calculating the crop water requirements. In this profile, the pan evaporation method was used to calculate the water requirement for different cultivated crops according to the cultivating period and cropping pattern (Water Data Base, ARIJ, 1995). Table 5.2 gives an estimate of the water requirements (evapotranspiration) based on estimates made using the pan evaporation method for different cultivated crops and cropping patterns in the Jericho district. The average total amount of water used by all crops under different cropping patterns in the Jericho district during the 1993/94 growing season was, given evapotranspiration, 18.42 MCM. This amount did not include that needed to make up the losses due to soil or the irrigation system (Agricultural Data Base, ARIJ, 1995). Of all types of crops in the Jericho district, fruit trees have the largest crop water requirement with 63% of the total water use, followed by vegetables with 32.2%, and field crops with 4.8%. Bananas alone consume approximately 51% of the total amount of irrigation water.

Future plans for agricultural improvement in the district must take into consideration both water consumption and income per crop, so as to optimize the water consumption in the most economical manner.

Irrigation Ponds

The irrigation pond is a water storage technique which allows for improving the conservation and efficiency in water use in the agricultural water delivery.

The first irrigation pond was constructed in the 1970 as a demonstration at the Jericho agricultural station with a capacity of 1,650 CM (Jericho Agricultural Station, 1994). The positive results achieved by this pond in increasing the productivity and improving the water use efficiency encouraged farmers to build these ponds and to use drip irrigation systems.

Soil irrigation ponds with plastic covers are most dominant in the Jericho district, with an average capacity of 3,403 CM/pond. Concrete irrigation ponds are less prominent and have a more limited capacity of just 300 CM/pond. A total of 45 concrete ponds and 186 soil ponds are located in the Jordan Valley. Of these, approximately 26 concrete ponds and 107 soil ponds are located in the Jericho district (Jericho Agricultural Station, 1994 &; Abed Al-Razaq &; Abu Saleh, 1991). Most of these ponds were established between the years 1970 and 1980. As shown in Figure 5.7, the rate pond construction in the Jericho district and Jordan Valley dropped in the 1980s (3.5 pond/year) and 1990s (1.3 pond/year) compared to the 1970s average of 6.1 pond/year (Abed Al-Razaq &; Abu Saleh, 1991). This is due to that in the 1981, the Israeli civil administration imposed constraints on building more ponds by requiring a license for each new irrigation pond. This license has been rarely granted. In addition to the high costs of construction and installation of an irrigation system using a pond.

Figure 5.7 Total number and rate of pond construction in the years 1970-1994

Most of the ponds in the Jordan Valley were designed and constructed by specialized engineers, reflecting the awareness of the Palestinian farmers about the importance of applying this technique in a proper manner. Many factors affect the efficiency of this technology such as: pond location in the farm, natural slope of the land, location of the water resources, pond construction and plastic covering to prevent water seepage.

Irrigation ponds in the Jordan Valley get their water mainly from the springs. Agricultural wells are used as well, and occasionally they are fed from the Mekorot, which is used as the last resort when other sources become dry, especially in the Al-Auja area (Abed Al-Razaq &; Abu Saleh, 1991).

Drip irrigation has been proven to increase water use efficiency by up to 90%. It is also known to increase agricultural productivity and solves the problems of water losses, which are often as high as 35% when traditional irrigation methods are used (especially furrow and contour furrow systems which use open canals) (Abd Al-Razaq &; Abu Saleh, 1991). Also, drip irrigation has increased the average productivity of vegetable crops by 243%, citrus trees by 148% and banana trees by 125% (Jericho Agricultural Station, 1994 &; Abed Al-Razaq &; Abu Saleh, 1991). More than 50% of the total cultivated area in the Jericho district are irrigated using these ponds.

Agricultural ponds and drip irrigation have played an important role in production improvement through the following factors: allowing better control of irrigation process and thus crop management; improving water use efficiency and at the same time reducing the time and effort needed for irrigation; allowing the possibility of improving water quality by mixing the saline water coming from agricultural wells with less saline water coming from springs, and thus increasing the size of cultivated areas; improving the planted area production; enhancing the summer crops cultivation during winter season; and increasing the farmers income.

Increasing the number of irrigation ponds will be one of the factors in improving plant production in the Jericho district. Clearly this will involve alleviating the constraints on the installation of new ponds and finding sources of funding or credit for farmers.

One promising prospect for this technology is to invest in aquacultural activities. A recent study by Hosh showed that there is a potential to use these ponds for fish farming despite the fact that water quality is limited by many factors including high temperatures. Fish species which are suitable for the area such as, tilapia, carp and catfish, are available Besides increasing the income of farmers, this could improve the quality of irrigation water by supplying the water with nitrogen and phosphorus, and the production would help in improving the Palestinian animal protein intake (Hosh, 1995).

Photo 4: Irrigation pond at the Jericho Agricultural Station.

Livestock Production

Because of the hot climate in the Jericho district, the design of the animal and poultry livestock farms is completely different from those in the high-lands. Open shed system is the most prevalent in the area.

Poultry:

There are about 10-12 farms of broilers in the Jericho district, with an average capacity of 8,500 birds per farm per round. Approximately 4-5 rounds are reared during the year. The number of broiler chickens produced was around 430,000 in 1994. Layers are much less common than broilers due to their inability to produce well in high temperatures. There is only one farm of layers in the Arab Development Society Project (ADS), with a total number of 3,600 birds in 1994 (PARC & Arab Thought Forum, 1994).

Sheep & Goats:

The numbers of sheep and goats in the Jericho district vary from one season to another. Because of the district's warm winter and the availability of range plants for grazing, Bedouins (Palestinian nomad herders) graze their sheep and goats in the Valley from November until February, returning to the hills in the highlands in the remaining months of the year.

Local strains of sheep and goats are dominant in the district with a total number of 24,000 heads. The majority of the sheep are Awasi while most of the goats are Baladi. There are few improved strains such as Shami goats or Assaf sheep.

Like other livestock in the Jericho district, sheep and goats are facing problems associated with hot climate. The high temperature results in more water consumption per animal due to the increasing respiratory rates, which in turn affects the production and net profit.

Dairy cows:

Approximately 451 dairy cows are reared in the district where almost 75% of these are at the ADS farm. Ninety-five percent of these are Friesian and the rest are local dairy cows (Table 5.3). The average daily milk production for both strains is nearly 15 Kg, which is 2.5 Kg/day below the average for the same strains elsewhere in the West Bank. This is due mainly to climatic conditions (PARC & Arab Thought Forum, No.2, 1994).

Beehives:

There are 7,540 beehives in the district, most of which are hybrid bees. The annual production of honey reached 113 tons, with an average yield of 15 Kg of honey per hive (PARC & Arab Thought Forum, No.3, 1994).

Agricultural Institutions

1- Jericho Agricultural Station:

This station occupies an area of 8 hectares of which approximately 4 hectares are planted with horticultural trees, such as bananas, date palms, and citrus. The remaining area is usually used for vegetable production, especially for agricultural demonstrations and experiments.

The goal of the station is the improvement of agricultural activities and increase of of the Jericho agricultural sector. It is now operating under the auspices of the Ministry of Agriculture in the Palestinian Authority. The office is staffed by agricultural engineers of different specialties working to rehabilitate the station's land and to provide services such as extension and research. Although the extension service and research are the main intended functions of this station, they have significantly deteriorated during the 27 years of occupation.

2- Arab Development Society Project (ADS):

This project was established in the mid-1940's by Mousa Al-Alami, on an area of 800 hectares. The Israeli authorities confiscated around 300 hectares of the project area after occupation in 1967 as most of this land was located in the Israeli declared military areas along the banks of Jordan River (ADS, 1992). The project aimed to achieve the following:

• Improve the socio-economic conditions of the Arab farmers.
• Improve the agricultural industries.
• Encourage the agricultural cooperative system.
• Encourage the planting of all types of suitable trees.
• Provide free agricultural and industrial training for poor people.
• Provide agricultural training on new technologies in agricultural production for farmers.

The project includes the following sections:

1. cow farm: There are approximately 300 heads of cattle, where approximately 117 of them produce 1.5-2.5 tons of raw milk daily.
2. milk processing unit: Usually operates as a training center for students about milk processing to produce yogurt, labaneh and white cheese.
3. poultry farm: This section contains 3,600 layers and was established to train students.
4. Vocational Training Center: The ADS runs a secondary school for boarding studentswhich provides certification for a Vocational Tawjehi in agricultural machinery, carpentry and metal work. The association offers free lodging, food, clothes, medical care, and teaching.

3- Jericho Agricultural Marketing Cooperative (JAMC):

The JAMC was founded in the 1959 with the main goal of helping the Jordan Valley farmers to market their vegetable and fruit products and to protect them from losses caused by marketing crises. With a current membership of 2,500 members, mostly farmers from the Jordan Valley, the cooperative has worked to find new markets outside the country to export excess production. Activities of the JAMC have included the following:

1. Helping to export agricultural products to Jordan and the Gulf markets.
2. Providing permits and documentation so that agricultural products can be accepted by the Jordanian Authorities. As part of this activity, the cooperative also compiled statistics of the annual cultivated areas and expected production in order to decide the volume of the exported vegetables and fruits (Jordanians often would allow imports based on estimated production and Jordanian absorption potential). This activity has been ceased following the establishment of Palestinian autonomy over Jericho area .
3. Distributing the money received from the PalestinianJordanian Joint Committeein order to provide support to Palestinian communities in the occupied territories throughout the 1980s. For example, the cooperative used these funds to support the Palestinian farmers and to compensate them for crop loss due to frost damage in 1987.
4. Initiation a farmstore in the Jericho district to provide farmers with agricultural equipment and chemicals at acceptable prices.

4- Palestinian Agricultural Relief committee (PARC):

PARC is a Palestinian agricultural NGO operates through branch offices throughout the West Bank and Gaza Strip. One of the oldest branches is the Jericho branch, which was founded in the 1983. It carries out many activities such as:

4.1 Plant production:

The branch office contains a 40 hectares farm. While most of this land was uncultivated when it was acquired, the area has been converted into viable farmland and is now used by PARC staff for plant production. By the end of the 1994, approximately 7 hectares were covered with plastic houses, including high tunnels. These houses will be used in the coming season. Also, 5 hectares are cultivated with bananas and big part of the rest area is devoted to cultivating open irrigated vegetables.

4.2 Training and extension programs:

The farm is also used for training newly graduated agricultural engineers on the applications of the most modern of technologies in irrigated agriculture. The training programs usually involve extension visits to farmers as well.

4.3 The women agricultural unit:

This unit aims to improve the social status and standard of living of agricultural women. It supplies funding to development projects that support women's activities especially at the domestic level.

Major Problems and needs

In an attempt to improve the agricultural sector in the district of Jericho, many problems need to be addressed. These include:

1. Limited waer resources, in large part because of the restrictions on the amount of pumped water.
2. Most of the spring's water is conveyed to irrigate lands through an open concrete or earthen channels. This results in a very high water losses either through evaporation or seepage into the ground.
3. Water and soil salinity are continuously increasing due to the fact that soil leaching treatments are not often enough applied.
4. Intensive agricultural techniques, while increasing short term production, have negatively affected the environment. The intensive usage of pesticide, especially methyl bromide for soil fumigation, has had negative effects on humans, the environment in general, the ecological balance of soil profile and groundwater (see Chapter 9). Also, the increasing quantities of generated solid wastes resulting from the extensive usage of soil plastic mulches, tunnels and plastic houses have negative effects on the environment and livestock. These covers are either left at the peripheries of the farm, leaving the risk that livestock might eat the plastic, possibly resulting in death, or burned on the farm causing air pollution. Residues of plastic left in the fields may also hinder soil quality (see Chapter 8).
5. Marketing crises due to lack of agricultural planning and controls.
6. The ability to export produce is controlled by the continuously changing political situation, often causing heavy losses for farmers.
7. Ineffective extension services which do not reach most of the farmers in the district.
8. Directions of use on the pesticides and fertilizers containers is always written in either Hebrew or English language which is forming a problem for most of the farmers.
9. The type of land tenure, where most of the lands are owned by wealthy holders of large areas, while farmers often work under share cropping arrangements.

Recommendations

The following recommendations may be important in contributing to the improvement of the agricultural activities in Jericho district:

1. Modern irrigation techniques should be introduced especially in citrus orchards.
2. New crops of high potential productivity and profit should be introduced such as, flowers, prostrate tomatoes, certain salt-tolerant date palm varieties and grape varieties which mature early under plastic houses.
3. Drainage systems like sub-surface lines should be applied to reduce land and water salinization.
4. Effective plant rotations should be applied.
5. Suitable rules for protecting farmers and developing more fair systems of land tenure should be put in place.
6. An active extension and research system should be built to detect the farmer problems and find suitable solutions.
7. Grading and storage centers for surplus production should be constructed to meet the international standards of marketing and exporting for agricultural commodities.
8. New markets for exporting the surplus agricultural production should be opened.