Farmers in the Jordan Valley are expressing anger and dissatisfaction with what they term government lack of support by dumping and destroying their tomato crops.

Due to the closure of the Syrian and Iraqi borders, this is the fifth season farmers are facing losses, unable to sell all the tomato production, which exceeds 1,000 tonnes daily, of which only around 400 tonnes are consumed locally.

The solution, the president of the Jordan Exporters and Producers Association for Fruit and Vegetables said, would be to diversify produce, with a caveat: ban on imports, to protect farmers.

While much of the tomato production, up to 600 tonnes, is sold to the Gulf Arab countries, and the Agriculture Ministry works to facilitate exports and search for new markets, overproduction makes it impossible to sell all the crops, making the problems seemingly intractable.

According to the president of the Jordan Valley Farmers Union, farmers’ losses during this year’s season stand at JD2 million.

If farmers do not consider diversifying their produce, they will continue to sustain losses.

Even if new markets can be found — and that is not easy, in view of the fact that the produce will have to be transported by plane, which increases the cost substantially and is more difficult in the case of perishable goods — farmers and government have to act to prevent such a situation from occurring, as it has quite regularly, with no lessons learnt.

Finding other markets for the Jordan Valley produce, especially in Europe, would offer a way out of the problem, but the European markets have yet to be exploited to the fullest because of lack of a sophisticated marketing strategy and high shipping costs.

At the same time, farmers will need to be careful about the use of pesticides and insecticides, which follow certain norms in international markets.

A solution would be to make preserves — tomato paste and canned vegetables, for example — which would entail building factories and, an added bonus, generating jobs. These are easier to export and have a longer shelf life.

Common government-farmers efforts need to be exerted to solve this crisis once and for all.

A new strategy could help make the Jordan Valley’s bountiful fruit and vegetable production economically feasible and help farmers reap the benefits of their toil.