On May 28, near Mbale, Uganda, the Abayudaya Jewish community celebrated the arrival of a tractor, gifted to them by Harmony Foundationof Canada. (photo from Elisha Higenyi & Tarphon Kamya / JRU)
On May 28, near Mbale, Uganda, the Abayudaya Jewish community celebrated a unique occasion – the arrival of a long-dreamt-of tractor.
For decades, the Abayudaya have lived as small and vibrant Jewish communities in a predominantly Christian and Muslim region; their faith rooted in a century-old embrace of Judaism. Life in this rural area is beautiful but challenging. Clean water is hard to find, health care is distant and most families, living on $2 a day, can’t afford to provide their children basic education. A tractor may seem unremarkable to many of us, but, for the Abayudaya and their neighbours, it is life-changing. With it, they can cultivate more land, increase yields, feed more families and send more children to school.
This gift of a tractor was made possible by the Harmony Foundation of Canada, which is supporting sustainable agricultural initiatives with the Abayudaya Jewish community in Uganda through Jewish Response Uganda. JRU is anonprofit founded by members of the Abayudaya in 2017. The organization has worked to improve lives by offering training in sustainable agriculture, helping farmers grow high-value crops, and supporting initiatives in education, health care and women’s empowerment.
With a tractor, the community can cultivate more land, increase yields, feed more families and send more children to school. (photo from Elisha Higenyi & Tarphon Kamya / JRU)
In a region where religious divisions often deepen hardship, JRU has chosen a path of inclusion. Today, Christians, Muslims and Jews work side by side in JRU programs, united by shared needs and a common hope for a better future. This inclusive approach fosters interfaith cooperation, mutual respect and a stronger, more united region.
For more information, watch the Harmony Foundation’s video The Abayudaya; Jews of Uganda on YouTube. You can email JRU at [email protected], or be in touch with Tarphon Kamya, project manager of JRU ([email protected]), or Elisha Higenyi, spiritual leader at JRU ([email protected]).
Spending a night in late March at Kibbutz Erez in southwestern Israel was an unforgettable experience. Visiting friends, it was somewhat eerie. Most residents have not returned since the Hamas terror attacks on Oct. 7, and the absence is profound.
The area is like a Canadian suburb. A group of houses surrounds a large grassy area, which has children’s playgrounds and lemon, orange and kumquat trees. This type of living is a rarity in Israel, where most people live in apartment buildings.
While the environment was scenic and comfortable, explosions could be heard in the distance and puffs of smoke periodically arose from Gaza, the border of which is less than a kilometre away. The Israel Defence Forces were entrenched nearby.
Kibbutz Erez fared better on Oct. 7 than many other kibbutzim and towns in the region because they received advanced warning from a neighbouring kibbutz that an attack was underway. Their neighbours had seen hang gliders from Gaza soaring overhead.
The security team of Kibbutz Erez quickly assembled to try to prevent the invaders from entering the kibbutz through the main gate. First, they called the IDF to make sure that the army wasn’t conducting an exercise. Receiving confirmation that it was a terrorist attack, the kibbutzniks asked how long it would take for the army to come – they were told they were on their own.
A firefight involving rifles, grenades and RPGs ensued. According to one of the kibbutzniks, “we fought like lions.” This was no ordinary military engagement, but a battle to protect their children and other family members from the Hamas terrorists. If they failed, they knew that Hamas would hurt their children.
Amir, one of the kibbutzniks, whose wife was expecting their first baby, was killed in the encounter. Danny received a bullet to the neck and Uri suffered wounds to his head and leg.
Liora, a nurse described as having nerves of steel, recognized that neither Danny nor Uri would survive without immediate medical attention. Both were bleeding profusely, and their level of consciousness was decreasing. With the help of a friend, she packed them into a car, drove out of the kibbutz amid a hail of bullets and got them to a nearby hospital, where they received lifesaving treatment. Both survived in relatively good physical shape.
After a fight of close to two hours, the terrorists decided that Kibbutz Erez was too difficult to overcome, and moved on to wreak havoc on the next village. The IDF did not arrive until later that day.
The whole kibbutz was evacuated to Mitzpe Ramon. Many of the families moved into hotel rooms there. After several weeks, makeshift schools were established and members of the kibbutz achieved some measure of normality, as much as it can be normal living in a hotel,totally dependent on caring neighbours, a supportive community and government help. Since then, some of the kibbutzniks have relocated to Kiryat Gat, which is much closer to their home. Some, including my friend, have returned home.
What is the future of Kibbutz Erez? People are slowly trickling back. The telling test will be in the summer, if families return in preparation for the start of the school year in September.
Kibbutz Hatzerim and Kibbutz Be’eri
Earlier in March, we visited extended family who live on Kibbutz Hatzerim, and heard about their experiences on Oct. 7.
People on Kibbutz Hatzerim awoke that day to sirens and multiple WhatsApp messages from friends and relatives, letting them know that Israel was under attack by Hamas terrorists, who were infiltrating the settlements close to the border. Were the attackers coming to Kibbutz Hatzerim, 20 kilometres west of Beer Sheva? Rumours circulated that they were on their way to Tel Aviv. People were reluctant to turn on their TVs, to protect their children from seeing the horrors that were happening. People received no directives from government sources or from the army. It was an information vacuum.
Some visitors at the kibbutz, who had arrived for Simchat Torah, decided to return to their homes in central Israel, but was it safe to drive there? Nobody knew.
Would the kibbutzniks be able to defend themselves? They did not have many weapons and the kibbutz could be easily infiltrated from several locations. But people on Kibbutz Hatzerim ended up being the fortunate ones. The terrorists were planning to move in that direction but didn’t make it that far. Apparently, they had killed and kidnapped enough people by then – 364 people killed and 44 kidnapped at the Nova music festival alone, mainly young people.
After Oct. 7, life returned to some degree of routine on Kibbutz Hatzerim. However, there were frequent missile attacks, necessitating trips to the bomb shelters. People were called up to do army service (miluim). The IDF was fighting in Gaza and soldiers were being killed. The plight of the more than 240 hostages was on everybody’s minds.
The death and destruction of some of Kibbutz Hatzerim’s neighbours is indescribable. Of special note is Kibbutz Be’eri: approximately 70 terrorists entered the kibbutz. Of the 1,000-plus residents, 97 kibbutz members were killed, 11 people were abducted and one-third of the houses were severely damaged.
Kibbutz Be’eri and Kibbutz Hatzerim have a lot in common. Hatzerim is famous for having developed the drip-irrigation technique and has a large production facility at the kibbutz. Be’eri houses one of the largest printing companies in Israel. Both kibbutzim resisted privatization, which many others had adopted as additional sources of revenue.
Hatzerim and Be’eri were both established in 1946 and both were comprised mainly of people on the left of the political spectrum. They looked forward to a peaceful future with the residents of Gaza. Many were involved in a program that transported sick people from Gaza to hospitals in Israel for advanced treatment. One of the residents of Be’eri, Vivian Silver, originally from Winnipeg, had learned Arabic to better communicate with her Palestinian neighbours, but that didn’t save her life on Oct. 7.
Currently, most residents of Kibbutz Be’eri are being housed in temporary locations, such as hotels in the Dead Sea area. They are safe and relatively free from missile attacks, but life is far from normal. Trying to reestablish a kibbutz lifestyle, while living in a crowded hotel with none of the amenities that glue kibbutzniks together, is challenging.
A house in Kibbutz Be’eri after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks. (photo by Tomer Persico)
A massive building project is now underway adjacent to Kibbutz Hatzerim. A whole new temporary kibbutz to house the residents of Be’eri is under construction. The plan is to have the temporary kibbutz finished by the summer, so that families can move in before school starts in September.
Some facilities, such as medical clinics and administrative offices, will be shared by the two kibbutzim. Otherwise, the temporary Kibbutz Be’eri will have its own houses, schools and offices. Hatzerim will expand its present dental clinic, seniors lounge and grocery store to accommodate the increased needs from the larger population. In typical kibbutz fashion, members of both kibbutzim have met many times to jointly plan this project.
The ultimate plan is to rebuild the original Kibbutz Be’eri, which was mainly destroyed on Oct. 7. It is hoped that this will be accomplished within the next two years.
Kibbutz Yiron
Look at the label on your kosher wine from Israel. Most likely it comes from Kibbutz Yiron. Next year will probably be different, as the kibbutz is on the Lebanese border and has been evacuated – no one is allowed into the area. As a result, according to one kibbutz member, the pruning of the vines, which usually takes place in the spring, did not happen this year. The same kibbutznik informed me that $20,000 worth of his favourite apple, Pink Lady, was left to rot.
Kibbutz Yiron is an oasis in the desert. We have visited because we have friends who live there, but people come from many other places in Israel and elsewhere to enjoy the mountain scenery, go for hikes and rest in a peaceful environment. Lebanon is visible in the background, but the border was quiet. It is heartbreaking to see this piece of paradise abandoned.
Spring pruning hasn’t been possible at Kibbutz Yiron’s vineyards because of the evacuation. (photo by B. Negin / flickr)
The jewel of Yiron was its Pinat Chai, a literal oasis consisting of a zoo with multiple animals, including a python, which would be taken out on non-feeding days and draped around the necks of unsuspecting visitors. Peacocks, ducks and geese roamed freely. Deer would run around their enclosed area, frequently escaping into the wider area, trying to evade recapture. A lake in the middle of the zoo was a star attraction. Row boats and paddleboats navigated the small artificial lake in a region with no natural lakes.
Kibbutz members looked forward to the day when Pinat Chai would serve as a meeting place for children and families of different origins. They anticipated a day when Lebanese children would enjoy themselves at Pinat Chai together with Israeli children.
But the zoo is now gone. The government also ordered them out of the kibbutz. The animals have been relocated to other places in Israel, and even to other countries.
The evacuation was part of a larger one that included all settlements close to the Lebanese border, like the city of Kiryat Shmona, with 22,000 inhabitants; and the town of Metulla, home of Canada Centre and one of only a few skating rinks in Israel. This area of northern Israel has special significance to the Jewish community of Vancouver, as our partnership region. Since the mid-1990s, Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver has worked closely with Etzba HaGalil (the Galilee Panhandle).
Kibbutz Yiron was not attacked on Oct. 7. However, the northern border has heated up since then. Hezbollah has been firing many missiles into the region, sometimes 30 per day, killing several Israelis.
Villages, especially in the Gaza Envelope, are receiving government compensation and many have relocated so that they are all living as a group, whether in Mitzpe Ramon or Eilat or the hotels at the Dead Sea. People in the north have not received the same compensation, so they are widely scattered. The kibbutznik with whom I spoke is living in a village close to Haifa. When I asked him when he’s going back to his home, he said anywhere from six months to maybe a couple of years.
There are many in Israel, including government ministers, who think that a war with Hezbollah is imminent. Hezbollah’s arsenal of weapons is much larger than that of Hamas, so a war with them could be even more destructive. The IDF has been stationing additional troops in the north, as tensions rise. Many people are strengthening their bomb shelters.
Looking to the future
Oct. 7 changed Israel in dramatic ways. Stories of neglect, abandonment and destruction are legion. At the same time, Israelis have shown incredible resilience to plan and rebuild for the future.
For many years, kibbutzim have defined Israel’s borders and acted as a protective barrier, both in the north and surrounding the Gaza Strip. But will the kibbutzim be able to rebuild their lives with some semblance of security? Can they ever again trust a government and an army that so dramatically let them down?
People are slowly returning to the kibbutzim surrounding Gaza, but many may never return. For the people along the Lebanese border, the situation in some sense is more dire. They have been exiled from their residences for more than seven months. The agricultural and industrial bases of the kibbutzim economies have been shattered. When will they be able to return? Will the small-scale conflict in progress along the Lebanese-Israel border become a major war?
It’s a very challenging time to be an Israeli, especially a kibbutznik living close to Israel’s borders. Hopefully, their future will include some degree of peace and normality.
Larry Barzelai is a semi-retired Vancouver family physician, who travels to Israel frequently to visit his three grandchildren there. He is presently co-chair of the Jewish Medical Association of British Columbia.
Biofeed’s Nimrod Israely, top centre, with mango growers in Karnataka, India. (photo from Biofeed via Israel21c)
Shortly before Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Israel in early July, Indian diplomats in Israel heard about a revolutionary no-spray, environmentally friendly solution against the Oriental fruit fly (Bactrocera dorsalis) made by Biofeed, a 10-employee ag-tech company. They invited Biofeed to be one of six innovative Israeli companies meeting with Modi and Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.
The company’s founder and chief executive officer, Nimrod Israely, who has a PhD in fruit-fly ecology, told the two leaders that Biofeed’s product can protect Indian farmers against fruit flies like the Iron Dome system protects the people of Israel against missiles. The Oriental fruit fly has been decimating 300 fruit species in India and in 65 other countries in Asia, Africa and the Americas and is considered to be the most destructive, invasive and widespread of all fruit flies.
Biofeed’s lures, hung on trees, contain an organic customized mix of food, feeding stimulants and control or therapeutic agents delivered by a patented gravity-controlled fluid release platform. Attracted by the odour, the fly takes a sip and soon dies – without any chemicals reaching the fruit, air or soil.
The launch of Biofeed’s first-in-class attractant for female Oriental fruit flies results from 15 years of development of the core platform and more than a year of development and testing in Israel and Karnataka, India. Mango farmers on four Indian orchards saw an overall decrease of fruit-fly infestation from 95% to less than five percent.
“We were hoping to bring a solution that will replace spraying and increase productivity by 50%,” Israely told Israel21c. “I am excited by the results, demonstrating the future potential for some farmers to bring about 900 times more marketable produce to market.”
A fruit fly feeding in a Biofeed lure. (photo from Biofeed via Israel21c)
One farmer in the Biofeed pilot explained that previously he had used a trap that attracted only male fruit flies, with limited success. “If you cut 25 fruits, we were getting only one good fruit; 24 were infected,” he said.
K. Srinivas Gowda, president of the 70,000-farmer Karnataka Mango Growers Association, wrote in a letter presented to Modi and Netanyahu that he “would like to have this [Biofeed] technology implemented to all the mango farmers through the government of India. This technology can be used to develop pest-free zones in the mango-growing belts in India.”
The pilot project started after Biofeed won a Grand Challenges Israel grant last year from the Israel Innovation Authority and the Foreign Ministry’s international development agency, Mashav.
“We don’t have the Oriental fruit fly in Israel. However, until now there was no solution for this problem. So, we took the challenge and chose to focus on India,” Israely said. The company worked with Kempmann Bioorganics in Bangalore to carry out the trial.
Biofeed’s products are used in many Israeli fruit orchards against the Mediterranean fruit fly and other common pests, including the olive fruit fly and the peach fruit fly (Bactrocera zonata).
“Bactrocera zonata is the number two pest in India. There are three main pests in India, so now we’ve given, within two years, a solution for the two most devastating fruit flies in India and in other parts of the world,” said Israely.
“We are the only company in the world with a solution for those two pests and both solutions are harmless to the environment,” he added. “We estimate the annual market potential of these two pest segments to be well over $1 billion.”
The Biofeed platform is effective with as few as 10 units per hectare and for a period of nearly a year before the dispenser needs replacing.
Biofeed, founded in 2005, also has a formula targeting mosquitoes that bear viruses such as Zika.
“Evolution has given insects an elaborate sense of smell, which they utilize to find mates, food, egg-laying sites and more,” Israely told Israel21c last year. “The company has developed a liquid formula that ‘knows’ how to tie different kinds of smells to other materials, as the need arises. The result is a special ‘decoy’ that draws the target insect through smell. The decoy is slow-released from a device over the course of a year. The insect is drawn to the decoy, feeds off it and dies shortly after.”
Headquartered in Kfar Truman, Biofeed sees the future of agriculture in developing countries such as India and China.
“We want to bring something that is extremely easy to use: you don’t need tractors, you don’t need to remember to spray once a week, you don’t need to put yourself in danger with sprays, there’s no safety equipment. This is something that can make a dramatic change in agriculture and human health,” said Israely.
Israel21cis a nonprofit educational foundation with a mission to focus media and public attention on the 21st-century Israel that exists beyond the conflict. For more, or to donate, visit israel21c.org.
Unripe (top) and ripe (bottom) tomatoes. Regular tomatoes (far left) start out green (far left top) and turn red when ripe (far left bottom). In contrast, genetically engineered tomatoes assume different shades of red-violet, depending on whether they produce betalains (the column second from left), pigments called anthocyanins (second from right) or betalains together with anthocyanins (far right). (photo from wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il)
Colour in the plant kingdom is not merely a joy to the eye. Coloured pigments attract pollinating insects, they protect plants against disease, and they confer health benefits and are used in the food and drug industries. A new study conducted at the Weizmann Institute of Science, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA, has opened the way to numerous potential uses of betalains, the highly nutritious red-violet and yellow pigments known for their antioxidant properties and commonly used as food dyes.
Betalains are made by cactus fruit, flowers such as bougainvillea and certain edible plants – most notably, beets. They are relatively rare in nature, compared to the two other major groups of plant pigments and, until recently, their synthesis in plants was poorly understood. Prof. Asaph Aharoni of Weizmann’s plant and environmental sciences department and Dr. Guy Polturak, then a research student, along with other team members, used two betalain-producing plants – red beet (Beta vulgaris) and four o’clock flowers (Mirabilis jalapa) – in their analysis. Using next-generation RNA sequencing and other advanced technologies, the researchers identified a previously unknown gene involved in betalain synthesis and revealed which biochemical reactions plants use to convert the amino acid tyrosine into betalains.
To test their findings they genetically engineered yeast to produce betalains. They then tackled the ultimate challenge: reproducing betalain synthesis in edible plants that do not normally make these pigments.
Tomatoes that have been genetically engineered to produce betalains only in the fruit, but not elsewhere in the plant. (photo from wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il)
The success announced itself in living colour. The researchers produced potatoes, tomatoes and eggplants with red-violet flesh and skin. They also managed to control the exact location of betalain production by, for example, causing the pigment to be made only in the fruit of the tomato plant but not in the leaves or stem.
Using the same approach, the scientists caused white petunias to produce pale violet flowers, and tobacco plants to flower in hues varying from yellow to orange pink. They were able to achieve a desired hue by causing the relevant genes to be expressed in different combinations during the course of betalain synthesis. These findings may be used to create ornamental plants with colours that can be altered on demand.
But a change in colour was not the only outcome. Healthy antioxidant activity was 60% higher in betalain-producing tomatoes than in average ones. “Our findings may in the future be used to fortify a wide variety of crops with betalains in order to increase their nutritional value,” said Aharoni.
An additional benefit is that the researchers discovered that betalains protect plants against grey mold, Botrytis cinerea, which annually causes losses of agricultural crops worth billions of dollars. The study showed that resistance to grey mold rose by a whopping 90% in plants engineered to make betalains.
The scientists produced versions of betalain that do not exist in nature. “Some of these new pigments may potentially prove more stable than the naturally occurring betalains,” said Polturak. “This can be of major significance in the food industry, which makes extensive use of betalains as natural food dyes, for example, in strawberry yogurts.”
Furthermore, the findings of the study may be used by the drug industry. When plants start manufacturing betalains, the first step is conversion of tyrosine into an intermediate product, the chemical called L-dopa. Not only is this chemical itself used as a drug, it also serves as a starting material in the manufacture of additional drugs, particularly opiates such as morphine. Plants and microbes engineered to convert tyrosine into L-dopa may, therefore, serve as a source of this valuable material.
The research team included Noam Grossman, Dr. Yonghui Dong, Margarita Pliner and Dr. Ilana Rogachev of Weizmann’s plant and environmental sciences department, and Dr. Maggie Levy, Dr. David Vela-Corcia and Adi Nudel of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Aharoni’s research is supported by the John and Vera Schwartz Centre for Metabolomics, which he heads; the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust; the Adelis Foundation; the Lerner Family Plant Science Research Fund; the Monroe and Marjorie Burk Fund for Alternative Energy Studies; the Sheri and David E. Stone Fund for Microbiota Research; Dana and Yossie Hollander, Israel; the AMN Fund for the Promotion of Science, Culture and Arts in Israel; and the Tom and Sondra Rykoff Family Foundation. Aharoni is the recipient of the André Deloro Prize, and the incumbent of the Peter J. Cohn Professorial Chair.
For more on the research being conducted at the Weizmann Institute, visit wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il.
A European honey bee extracts nectar from an aster flower. (photo by John Severns via Wikimedia Commons)
Around the world, bee populations have been decreasing in number, year by year, at an alarming rate. Such a tragedy isn’t just stinging the beekeepers, whose livelihoods depend on the honey-making insects, it’s affecting global agriculture.
And there’s more at stake than just honey production. Bees’ handiwork assists in the growth of myriad foodstuffs. In fact, millions of honey bees are depended upon to pollinate plants and crops, which produce a quarter of the food we consume.
According to Science Daily from May 2015, beekeepers across the United States lost more than 40% of their honey bee colonies from April 2014 to April 2015, compared to the previous year’s decrease of 34%.
This is determined from an annual cross-country survey that is funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and conducted by Bee Informed Partnership with the Apiary Inspectors of America.
The survey asked commercial and small-scale beekeepers to track the health and survival rates of their honey bee colonies, in an effort to understand how to manage the decreasing population. This is the ninth straight year of losses. It’s referred to as colony collapse disorder.
More than 6,000 beekeepers, who manage 400,000 colonies from all 50 U.S. states responded. All told, these beekeepers are responsible for nearly 15% of the nation’s estimated 2.74 million managed honey bee colonies. The total economic value of honey bee pollination is said to be more than $15 billion each year in the United States alone.
Among small beekeepers – those who manage fewer than 50 colonies – a problem area appears to be the varroa mite, a lethal parasite, able to spread between colonies.
Beekeepers, environmental groups and some scientists also suspect blame lies with an insecticide known as neonicotinoids, or neonics. It is used on crops, such as corn, and on plants found in lawns and gardens. Its toll has been taken seriously enough that the Environmental Protection Agency is examining a series of studies on the insecticide and its effects on bees. The investigation is expected to be completed by year’s end.
The issue has even caught the attention of administrators at the White House, who have formed a task force to study the problem.
In Canada, the problem is even worse.
In Ontario, bee losses have been severe over the last few winters, measuring a decline of 58% in 2013-2014, due to a combination of extreme cold, mites, disease and the types of pesticides used on crops.
While it has experts scrambling for a solution, some people and companies are taking matters into their own hands.
One hotel is doing its part to increase the bee population. On the roof of the downtown Fairmont Royal York in Toronto, about 300,000 bees perch in six hives that produce anywhere between 500 and 900 pounds of honey per year. The hotel offers it to guests, and uses it in recipes.
CBC also recently installed hives on its rooftops in Toronto and Montreal, while Vancouver Police will build two hives at its headquarters.
Meanwhile, across the pond in England, the BBC reported that, in January 2014, in more than half of European countries, there were not enough honey bees to pollinate crops. And more than 14% of England’s honey bee colonies died over the winter, according to the latest research from the British Beekeepers Association (BBKA).
In the United Kingdom alone, nearly 90% of the apple crop and 45% of the strawberry crop relies on wild bees and managed honey bees to grow. It is a billion dollar economy there.
The BBKA’s annual survey of beekeepers across Great Britain showed the losses were up from nine percent last year, but lower than the year before; normal losses are about 10%. It blames “poor and variable weather, pesticides, bee diseases and parasites such as the varroa mite and starvation.”
To make matters worse, demand for the little honey-making insects has grown, while their numbers shrink.
Europe is experiencing a boom in biofuels, which is the result of the “EU renewable fuel directive,” where 10% of transport fuel must come from renewable sources by 2020. What that means for farming is planting a third more “oil” crops, like soybeans, oil palm, oilseed rape, sunflowers – all of which require ramping up bee numbers, which simply aren’t there.
According to the journal Plos One, Great Britain has only a quarter of the bees they need – their deficit equaling seven billion honey bees.
In light of this, as we approach Rosh Hashanah, you may think more about that little jar of honey on the festive meal table – millions, or perhaps billions, of honey bees came together to create that sweet liquid.
We know that the symbolism of honey on Rosh Hashanah is to have a sweet New Year. But there’s more: bees and the Jewish people are alike in many ways.
There’s little we can accomplish if we are alone; much that we can accomplish if we combine our efforts towards our goals as a people. We are more productive when in a community; our “hives” are our communities and synagogues, where we are needed – in fact, required – to be drawn to the whole. The honey bee teaches us that we must come together and work towards a higher purpose.
May everything go well next year not only for ourselves, friends, family and others, but for our little busy bee friends, buzz’mun hazeh!
Dave Gordonis a Toronto-based freelance writer whose work has appeared in more than a hundred publications around the world.
Arava International Centre for Agriculture Training executive director Hanni Arnon spoke to audiences across Canada as part of a Jewish National Fund nationwide tour. (photo by Rebeca Kuropatwa)
As part of a nationwide tour, with stops in Ontario, Manitoba, Alberta and British Columbia, Hanni Arnon, executive director of Arava International Centre for Agriculture Training (AICAT) of the Arava Development Co., introduced the training program to Canadian audiences.
In 1994, Arnon founded AICAT. The goal of the centre is to educate students from countries around the world on how to form successful agricultural businesses. Her cross-Canada talks – Feeding the World through Education – were organized by Jewish National Fund of Canada, its local branches and support from various other local Jewish organizations.
In her presentation in Winnipeg, Arnon shared her personal story about having been born and raised in Jerusalem. About 30 years ago, she chose to follow her dream and move with her husband, Moti, to the Arava region.
“We were looking for a life with challenges and fulfilment,” she said. “We wanted our children to grow up connected to nature and to be a part of a community that understands and appreciates the meaning of hard work, Zionism, solidarity and friendship.”
Some 900 families live in the central Arava, which is a desert. Given the harsh climate, general lack and poor quality of water, residents had little choice but to find creative solutions and overcome the daily difficulties they encountered. They have gathered more than 50 years of experience and research, with science as the foundation.
“With hard work, we made the desert bloom,” said Arnon. “We are the world leader in desert beautification and a prime example for effective water use. We have the ability to think outside the box and make the impossible possible.”
The global population is reaching more than seven billion, including 800 million people in poverty. Arnon is looking for a way to feed them by focusing on collaboration and the transfer of knowledge, which she feels will lead to empowerment and the opening of opportunities. She acknowledged that knowledge itself is not enough, that it needs to be coupled with training.
“For over 20 years,” she said, “AICAT has had the great privilege to bring every year, with the permission of the Israeli government, hundreds of students from 12 developing countries, such as Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, Nepal, Cambodia, South Sudan, Nigeria, Rwanda, Uganda, Ethiopia and Indonesia – a multitude of cultures, religions and nationalities that have participated in the unique program across borders.”
AICAT provides students with practical knowledge in everything from vegetable production to business management, marketing, research, technology and strategic thinking. The goal is for students to return home to “establish their own agriculture business and improve their farms,” said Arnon.
According to Arnon, AICAT – which has 40,000 graduates to date – teaches the most important lesson – that if you want something earnestly enough, you can make it happen. Every year, she said, she sees how, after 11 months, the students have a light in their eyes and are keen to apply the new ideas to helping their home countries.
“We give them hope and self-confidence to follow their dreams and improve their lives,” said Arnon. “They become entrepreneurs and future leaders of their countries.”
Arnon noted that not only do the students gain the knowledge and inspiration, but they go on to become goodwill ambassadors for the state of Israel. “They go home and talk about how much Israel means to them,” she said. “This is positive action on the Israeli side, which shows Israel in a different light.”
When Arnon was asked a question about cooperation with the Jordanians, she spoke about the different ways AICAT works with neighboring farmers. “Just to make sure you understand how close we are, the place where our fields end, this is the border,” she said. “It’s an open border with no fence. We have a peace agreement, so it’s a quiet border. We send our expertise to support farmers in Jordan. We are open for any collaboration with the Jordanians and would especially like cooperation with our neighbors.
“We also have a project [called] Clean Arava and we must do that together with the Jordanians, because we are so close to them. This is one of the projects we are doing together.”
Arnon explained that the Arava region is the biggest vegetable exporting area in Israel, producing more than 60% of the fresh vegetables Israel exports. The main crops are sweet peppers, tomatoes and melons, but they also grow flowers, grapes, mangos and dates. (The Arnon family owns a large date farm.)
As for the students involved in the project, Arnon noted that they pay for a one-way ticket to Israel, a medical exam and a passport. They can work while in Israel to earn their fare back home and tuition fees, while also taking home with them $2,000-$3,000 to help put into practice what they have learned.
“We see the impact on students,” said Arnon. “They are going back home as leaders, entrepreneurs, with knowledge, skills and money to start an agricultural business. Many of them, about 30%, continue on to higher education.”
The original inspiration for AICAT was the need to teach Thai workers in the 1990s about agricultural systems. Arnon, having been trained as a teacher for that work, immediately felt that a school should be created to teach the subject on an ongoing basis to as many students as possible.
AICAT presently teaches about 1,200 students per year, but Arnon is hoping to double that number with a new campus that will break ground in March.
As for funding, no government funding or support is provided, apart from providing the students with visas. It is JNF that provides support for facilities, dormitories and programs.
Ariel Karabelnicoff, director of JNF Manitoba and Saskatchewan, closed the Winnipeg event by sharing that the school has 80 students from Indonesia, an Islamic country with no diplomatic ties with Israel.
While in Winnipeg, Arnon also took time to speak to University of Manitoba students and visited the Canadian Museum of Human Rights. In Vancouver, hosted by JNF Pacific Region, she spoke at Temple Sholom, Beth Israel and Schara Tzedeck.
The talks were timed with the celebration of Tu b’Shevat and JNF’s fundraising campaign for a 6.5-kilometre park in Eilat. For more information on the campaign, email [email protected] or call 604-257-5155.
