FAO/Marwa Nisafi

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) launched an inception meeting last month with 23 representatives from different stakeholders across the olive value chain, including the Syrian Ministry of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform (MAAR), olive producers, in addition to public and private olive processing companies and experts, traders and exporters, and support services providers. The inception workshop was part of the regional Technical Cooperation Programme (TCP) “Evidence-based policy and investment for sustainable development of the value chains of Special Agricultural Products in the Near East and North Africa (NENA)” under the FAO global initiative One Country One Priority Product (OCOP).

OCOP was initiated by the Director General of FAO in 2021, aiming at improving practices and investment in greening Special Agricultural Products (SAPs) and their production, storage, processing and market. After launching in the NENA region in 2022, FAO Regional Office for Near East and North Africa (FAO-RNE) developed a regional TCP to support the governments in six selected countries in analyzing the status of the value chains and designing upgrading strategies for the priority products. Thus, taking place in Hama city on 26 June 2023, the inception meeting reflects Syria’s participation to OCOP, where the country selected olives as a priority agricultural product.

Historically, due to its fertile lands and suitable weather conditions, Syria has produced olives for thousands of years, making the country widely known as the origin of olive trees. Olives and olive oil are the fundamental ingredients for Syrian dishes because of its taste and nutritional value for healthy diet. In addition, it contributes to employment and is an important source of income particularly for rural farmers, as the demands for olives and olive oil in the international markets are stably increasing. With this background, MAAR has decided to focus on olive value chain as Syria’s strategic priority product under this initiative.

The objectives of the meeting were to introduce the OCOP and key highlights of the regional TCP, to share preliminary results of the olive value chain analysis in Syria, and to get feedbacks and inputs from stakeholders to support further analyses. The participants were divided into working groups where they discussed and agreed on findings in the preliminary analysis of the value chain and the work plan presented by an FAO national expert Hani Al Hasoun. The interactive working group session was concluded with three main outputs including: (i) an agreed value chain map indicating key functions, actors, and their roles and linkages, (ii) a Strength, Weakness, Opportunity and Threat (SWOT) analysis and, (iii) a list of key challenges at all value chain stages and suggested interventions that can contribute to improving value chain performance.

These outputs will be verified through key informant interviews and field observations in the governorates of Hama, Homs, Tartous, Lattakia, as well as the accessible parts of Aleppo, Idleb, Daraa and the Eastern region. The findings of the secondary and primary studies will be presented to a number of value chain actors and stakeholders in a following validation meeting for discussion and endorsement. This conclusion will contribute to the design of an upgraded strategy to improve the olive value chain performance that will later lead to the creation of a project proposal for its implementation.