Olive Co-operative's Trees For Life programme

Olive Co-operative has developed, in partnership with the Palestine Fair Trade Association and Zaytoun, the Trees for Life programme. This offers the public the opportunity to sponsor the planting of olive trees in Palestine.

The new trees go some way towards offsetting the destruction wrought in Palestinian olive groves by the Israeli army and settlers. Settlement and settlement road building and the construction of the Separation Wall have seen hundreds of thousands of trees bulldozed and cut down. According to the Applied Research Institute Jerusalem over 500,000 olive trees have been destroyed since 2000. Each new tree sponsored represents a long-term source of income for Palestinian families, who have been harvesting olive oil, fruit and wood for generations.

The trees are distributed in Palestine by the PFTA to farmers who follow fair trade guidelines and who will benefit from future purchases of Palestinian olive oil.

£20 will sponsor five trees. All sponsors will receive a thank you letter. If your tree sponsorship is a gift to someone else, please specify this in your order and you will also receive a gift card to personalise and pass on.   Sponsorship online is available from the Olive Co-op shop, or by sending a cheque made payable to 'Olive Co-operative', Bridge 5 Mill, 22a Beswick Street, Manchester M4 7HR.

*** Latest Trees for Life News - Feb 07 ***

Trees for Life, launched in Summer 2006, has been a huge success. 300 Olive Co-operative supporters have raised over £20,000 to plant more than 5,000 new olive trees in Palestine. We are very proud to say that Olive Co-operative was the single biggest contributor to the Trees for Life program in 2006, providing just over 50% of the total money raised.

Particularly generous donations have come from Zacharia Mosque, Bolton, who raised over £10,000, funding 2,500 trees; and the New Statesman, who offered olive tree sponsorship with magazine subscriptions, attracting sponsorship for 870 trees.

Sponsored trees have been planted in 18 Palestinian villages in the Jenin, Nablus, and Salfit areas.

Olive Co-operative has recently returned from another successful tour of Palestine. Tour participants helped to plant new olive trees sponsored as part of the program, and met the farmers and communities whose livelihoods are being supported.

Download a copy of the Trees for Life leaflet.

See Pictures from the trees for life project in Palestine,
including pictures of sponsored trees being planted in January this year.

Press coverage of Trees for Life

• Positive News from around the world, 25 May 2006, 'Trees for Life'
• Activist Network, 15 May 2006, 'Trees for Life - Planting Peace in Palestine'
• VITA Europe, 30 May 2006, 'Planting for Peace'

Partner organisations

The Palestine Fair Trade Association (PFTA) is a union of farming and producing cooperatives, traders and processors based in Jenin that promotes and supports fair and equitable trading principles. These principles are developed locally by PFTA and are compatible with international fair trade principles and in keeping with Palestinian traditions. PFTA is also active in promoting fairly produced Palestinian products in international fair trade markets in Europe, North America, Australia, and Japan. See www.palestinefairtrade.org.

Zaytoun is an ethical business established to support marginalized farming communities in Palestine, principally by importing fairly traded Palestinian olive oil and other agricultural products and by promoting fair trade with Palestine. See www.zaytoun.org

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Trees for Life and the PFTA

Trees for Life, through the Palestine Fair Trade Association (PFTA), will plant thousands of olive trees in Palestine every year in the period between Tree Day (February 15) and Land Day (March 30).

As well as the development aspects of tree planting, this program helps connect the Palestinian fair trade farmers and producers to the grassroots fair trade movement in Europe and North America in a meaningful way. Trees for Life is a medium to connect Palestinian people to the solidarity they have worldwide. The Trees for Life project is solely funded by grassroots movements abroad and solely invested in the Palestinian fair trade movement in Palestine.

PFTA's and partners in Europe and North America are committed to finding many ways to benefit farmers in Palestine. This project helps to offset the enormous destruction of trees by the Israeli army, Israeli settlers, and the Israeli segregation wall in Palestine in order to keep Palestine livable and keep Palestinian roots alive in the land of Palestine. Trees for Life provide individual Palestinian farmers with 25 to 50 new olive tree saplings (3 years old and grown in a Jenin nursery) to plant and nurture in order to renew their decimated groves.

Recipient Selection

Farmers that are interested in participating in the Trees for Life tree planting project complete an application through PFTA coordinators in the village or directly at the PFTA office in Jenin. All applications are reviewed by the PFTA office in Jenin and allocations are granted based on meeting the following conditions and according to the approved
priorities:

• Applicant must be a certified member of the Palestine Fair Trade Association program for the production of olive oil. If a new farmer, applicant must demonstrate readiness to become fair trade certified and be willing to implement fair trade guidelines.
• Applicant must own a land suitable for the number of trees applied for.
• Applicant must demonstrate capacity to care for and nurture trees.
• Applicant must be ready to prepare land for a collective tree plantation day that will be set for the specific village. All trees must be planted the day of delivery. Representatives of PFTA will deliver and distribute the trees and insure prompt planting. Farmers must have land ready and dug prior to delivery.

Priority is given to the following applicants:

• Small farmers
• Farmers that have lost trees to the Israeli destruction and uprooting war machines.
• Women that own their own land and are interested in farming.
• Young starter farmers that have inherited or acquired land.

PFTA representatives visit all participant farmers in June to check on the care of the trees, and assess needs for watering over the summer months to ensure the survival of the trees. Farmers requiring assistance to water trees during summer months will be assisted by PFTA.

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