An expression of discontent among fruit growers in parts of Israel is rapidly turning into a country-wide movement.
Hundreds of fruit growers from the northern region are joining the 1,200 growers who have already announced that they will not pay any levies to the Plants Production & Marketing Board (PPMB). An emergency meeting this week by some 2,000 growers is scheduled to call upon the government to shut down the board.
The movement - dubbed the Fruit Rebellion by Israeli media - started when 1,200 growers, approximately one-third of the country’s producers who between them grow more than half of its total fruit output, decided to stop paying levies imposed on them by the PPMB. They claimed the levies were too high and that they “got nothing in return”.
A spokesperson for the fruit growers claimed that the Israeli farm ministry and the board “are making every possible move to hinder the business activities of the fruit rebels, such as delays in granting export licences and imposing bureaucratic measures regarding the allocation of foreign workers”.
The rebels said they plan to take more “extreme measures” aimed at forcing the board to cancel the levies it imposes on them.
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