Agriculture

Agriculture plays an important role in the Tunisian economy which consists mostly of olive oil, cereals, dates, fruits and vegetables. Together with fishery, it accounted for 9.1% of GDP in 2016, generating €3.1bn. The sector has had to deal with several challenges, including land fragmentation, which contributes to poor access to credit; a considerable technology gap; climatic fluctuation and weak irrigation infrastructure, which has led to low productivity. In the face of increasingly constrained public funding, the government has chosen to lay the groundwork for attracting further private investment to help modernise the sector, with raising access to irrigated water one of the top priorities in the Tunisia 2020 strategy. This will be to the sustainable growth of Tunisia’s agriculture. This chapter contains an interview with Chokri Bayoudh, CEO, Office Nationale de l’Huile d’Olive.