«We will still maintain the primacy on quality but we are in difficulty with regards to product quantities. For this reason, structural renovations of the plants and recovery of abandoned olive groves can no longer be postponed to allow production to return to the levels of excellence of ten years ago “. David Graneri, president of Unaprol, summarizes the first estimates of the 2021 olive campaign developed with Coldiretti and Ismea. Forecasts that, however, will have to pass the examination of the climate factor, especially as regards the quantity of product which should in any case be 15 percent higher, touching 315 million kilos. “We were all waiting for the year in office but, unfortunately, the climatic trend and the great drought have hit hard the olive farms of our country, which have increased their irrigation investments to save production,” explains Graneri.
Puglia continues to suffer even if there could be double-digit increases in production that should allow us to reach 200 million kilos. Sicily, after three difficult seasons, could return above the 40 million kg threshold, while some more problems are recorded in Calabria where there is a slight increase very far from the maximum regional production. Negative year for Tuscany and Umbria (peaks of -50%) which suffer from uncertain climatic trends and could suffer, due to the humidity of this period, possible attacks by the oil fly, while among the central regions Lazio maintains substantially unchanged the production of the last year.
The black jersey of the season that has just begun goes to the regions of the North, Lombardy in the lead, hit by periods of frost and extreme heat that have reduced production to a minimum (estimates from -60 to -80%). Numbers that make the recovery of the sector slower than expected and risk slipping our country off the podium of world production.
This explains why Coldiretti presented a specific project linked to business networks for the future of olive oil as part of the Recovery Plan. “The goal is to relaunch the national production of olive oil to confirm the primacy of quality of Made in Italy – explains the president Ettore Prandini – through the construction of new olive groves, irrigation systems and construction of wells or ponds, also in a consortium way, favoring the mechanized harvesting of olives with machinery that reduces harvesting times and costs ».