Three years ago I wrote a series of articles objecting to the subsidies paid by the state to encourage farmers to plant date palms, a policy I believe continues. I pointed to the potential damage if dates production is allowed to grow year on year while demand stays the same. Given that out of the 800,000-plus tons of dates produced annually in the Kingdom, only five percent is exported while local consumption does not exceed 50 percent, the huge surplus means both the farmers and the state continue to sustain losses. The remaining 55 percent of production is stored.
At the time I demanded an immediate end to subsidies and a revision of the loans given to date farmers by the agricultural banks. My articles generated criticism and anger. But from a realistic point of view it was obvious that growing more date palms and encouraging date farmers through subsidies and loans amount to a dumping policy that is damaging in other ways too.
The date palms need huge amounts of water in a country already suffering from a severe shortage of this precious commodity. Contrary to what many might think, growing date palms is highly water-intensive, as any agricultural college will tell you.
I raised the alarm hoping for a quick end to the squandering of financial and water resources, but to no avail. The negative effects began surfacing at an accelerated pace. Local overproduction mounted despite the government policy of sending dates as relief material to poor countries and disaster areas.
With the worsening situation, more voices began demanding urgent action. Date producer associations were set up in Qassim, Riyadh and Madinah. The Riyadh Chamber of Commerce & Industry got involved, holding meetings and seminars on the issue.
The latest such gathering was held in Madinah with the support of Madinah Governor Prince Muqrin and in the presence of Agriculture Minister Dr. Fahd Balghaneim.
The minister was presented with demands of the producers, who wanted a ministerial decision allowing dates to be served to patients in the country’s hospitals. I believe the ministry will answer the demand and we may see other ministries follow suit, which means that the citizens continue to pay for official mistakes and bad planning.
In a recently published report one expert warned against the continuous squandering of water and called on the ministry to stop the growing of date palms. A single palm was found to consume 180 cubic liters of water per year, against just five cubic meters for a citrus tree. It is not difficult to imagine the threat to the country’s already scare water resources posed by the country’s now 23 million date palms.
