Back to the roots: The farmer-entrepreneur from Palestine

On weekdays, you will find Laila Sbaih in Ramallah, the bustling political and economic centre of the West Bank, Palestine.

She is a veteran of the Palestinian civil service – 28 years and counting. Having spent the majority of her career with the Finance Ministry, she is currently with the Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation. Her responsibilities entail aid management and development planning, ensuring alignment and shaping reform strategies for Palestine’s fragile economy.

But come the weekend, she travels north. Past checkpoints, through closures, across hills and valleys – sometimes taking five hours for what should be a 90-minute drive.

She returns not to rest, but to tend to her second calling: A small, fruit-laden farm in Tubas.

Her piece of Palestine.

From bureaucrat to farmer

I met Laila recently at a senior fellowship programme in Singapore. Her story unearthed new appreciations of Palestine for me.

“I grew up among olive and almond trees,” Laila shares, reflecting on the activities of her father and mother, and their ancestors before them.

The youngest of nine children, she was raised in a rural village near Jenin.

“Farming was never just about income. It was identity. Every city here is linked to its crops – Jericho is dates. Hebron is grapes. Haifa is oranges. But olives belong to all of Palestine”.

That connection never left her. When she married in 2001 and moved to a new town, the first thing she did was to buy land.

“My husband’s family are refugees. They had no land. We needed to plant roots,” she says.

On her 10-donum (1-acre) plot, the first trees she planted were olive. But the land gave little in return at first. In 2004, she hired someone to tend to it while she was posted to Ramallah.

For years, the farm yielded more weeds than fruit. Still, she held on.

“It wasn’t about profit. It was about having something to return to.”

Seeds of resilience

The story of Palestine is not just written in treaties or tragedies. It is written in the soil.

As Laila explains the workings of the Palestinian National Authority, it becomes clear how layered the reality is.

“Our government works like any other,” she says. “We are 185,000 strong. We plan, budget, and implement. But we do it under occupation (of the Israelis).”

Over 65% of Palestine’s revenue – tax collected at borders – is held by Israel.

“Based on the 1994 Paris Protocol, that money is supposed to be transferred monthly. Often, it isn’t. It weakens us and makes us look like we cannot deliver.

“In reality, the civil service often does its best to provide basic services from food and water to healthcare and energy – even renewable energy.”

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, most public servants, including Laila and her husband, stopped receiving full salaries – a situation that has persisted until today.

Still, she kept working. But she also began looking again at her land.

“I had always made jams and pickles at home,” she says. “During Covid, friends who had tasted them told me, ‘Laila, this is a business. You should sell this.’,”

Going back to the roots

“I thought hard about what my identity was. What would make this unique?” she reflects.

Her answer was both poetic and powerful: go back to the roots. Do it the way her mother and grandmother did. Make food that was genuine, handmade, and true to the land.

She diversified her farm – planting apricots, figs, lemons, berries, grapes, pomelos, pomegranates, cherries, and almonds. From the produce, she began crafting recipes drawn from memory and love.

She launched her project officially in mid-2024. It carries a mission statement that reads more like a poem:

“Our story is the story of roots linked to the holiness of the land, the fragrance of its plains, and the majesty of its mountains… Our products are the land’s message to all parts of the world: we are here to stay.”

Laila’s farm crops (clockwise top left-right): Oranges, peaches, grapes, almonds, olives, and the making of black olive pickles

Obstacles and determination

But like every Palestinian dream, this faces daily hurdles.

“Access to finance is hard,” Laila explains. “Grants and loans come with complex conditions. I had to use my savings and take a loan to get started.”

Then there’s the issue of movement. “Road closures since October 7 (2023) have made even domestic sales difficult. Exporting is a whole other thing. It needs networks and technical knowledge that many of us don’t have.”

And there’s time. Laila is still a full-time civil servant. “I rely on family members to help. I’m based in Ramallah, and the farm is in Tubas. That’s not easy, especially when checkpoints can turn a one-hour journey into five.”

Still, she persists. “This is not just a business. It’s a personal and national responsibility.”

Of legacy, land and purpose

In a time where so much of Palestinian life is framed through tragedy and resistance, Laila’s story reminds us of something quieter – yet just as powerful: That resilience can be found in a spoonful of jam.

That identity is preserved not just through politics, but through recipes passed down from mother to daughter. At the end of the day, Laila is doing this to connect her children to a land that too many are forced to forget.

“We are more than a cause,” Laila tells me as we wrap up. “We are people. Farmers. Workers. Parents. We are not going anywhere.”

It is, in every sense, a journey back to the roots.

And in Palestine, perhaps that’s the most powerful journey of all.