MADRID: Spain, the world’s top producer of olive oil, which had a challenging year in 2022, now fears an olive “catastrophe” due to continuous drought and high temperatures.
“It’s barely rained since January.
In the south, the heart of Spain’s olive oil industry, Andalusia, is home to Cristobal Cano, where the secretary general of the small farmers’ Union (UPA) is concerned about the ground’s dryness. In his 20 years as a farmer, Cano, who has 10 hectares of olive trees in Alcala la Real, close to Granada, has never experienced such a concerning circumstance.
He warned, “It will be a catastrophe if something has not changed radically in the coming weeks.”
The AEMET meteorological agency reports that overall rainfall since October 1 has been 25% lower than average in Spain and 50% lower in most of Andalusia, where reservoirs are at 25% capacity.
The situation only worsened when an early heatwave produced unusually high temperatures that saw the mercury reach 38.8 degrees Celsius (101.8 degrees Fahrenheit) in southern Spain at the end of April.
Rafael Pico, director of Asoliva, the Spanish organisation of olive oil producers and exporters, claims that “this happened while the olive trees were in bloom” and expresses concern that the flowers will eventually fade. “Fruit cannot exist without flowers. Oil is also absent if there is no fruit.
‘On the brink of collapse
The scenario is even more concerning for Spain, which generally supplies 50% of the world’s olive oil and exports close to 3.0 billion euros ($3.3 billion) annually, considering the sector’s miserable output in 2021–2022.
According to data from the agriculture ministry, during that season as well, olive oil production fell by 55% to 660,000 tonnes from 1.48 million tonnes in 2021–2022 due to a lack of rain and extremely high temperatures. This year, the scene is expected to repeat itself.
The leading olive cooperative in Spain, Dcoop, is led by Rafael Sanchez de Puerta. “Looking at the forecasts, it’s almost a given; it’s going to be another grim year,” says Sanchez de Puerta.
Numerous olive farms may not survive if the predictions come true. “We can survive a challenging year. It’s an organic phase of the growth process. But doing it twice in a row will be disastrous. Many are about to collapse, he claims.
Many people in Spain make their living from the production of olive oil; Asoliva’s Pico asserts that “farmers need liquidity” to survive the expense of machinery, paying wages, and repaying loans.
