With the war in Ukraine which has tripled production costs and the crazy climate with frosts and droughts which take away liquidity from companies and halve production, support is arriving to modernize oil mills, an opportunity in Puglia for 839 active mills to offer the market 5 DOP oils and the IGP Olio di Puglia.
The news was given by Coldiretti Puglia, in relation to the publication of the Masaf decree relating to the “distribution in favor of the Regions and autonomous Provinces of euro 500 million (Pnrr – Mission 2 component 1, Investment 2.3 – Innovation and mechanization in the agricultural and food) and the definition of the methods for issuing regional tenders relating to 100 million allocated to the sub-measure “modernization of oil mills”.
This is an opportunity – says Coldiretti Puglia – for the olive oil supply chain which is worth over 1.2 billion euros in its agricultural phase and 3 billion in the industrial one, with Puglia producing almost 50% of the Made in Italy oil Italy. Olive growing in Puglia represents 32% (373 thousand hectares) of the entire Italian olive growing and 25% of the regional agricultural surface – adds Coldiretti Puglia – of which approximately half of the olive trees are centuries-old and 3-5 million specimens are even planetary, where between Bari and the BAT province there are 132 thousand hectares of olive trees, practically 35% of Apulian olive growing.
It also represents a breath of fresh air for the Salento oil mills which, due to Xylella, have sold production lines abroad and over 100 oil mills in the last 10 years have not opened their doors due to the collapse in olive production, but in addition to tropicalization of the climate and to , cardboard, tin cans, up to plastic.
To support national production, resist climate change and defend national food sovereignty and the Mediterranean diet of which oil is a fundamental component – states Coldiretti Puglia – a strategic plan is needed for the construction of new olive groves with Italian varieties, resources for counteract the dramatic increase in the management costs of agricultural companies and create new irrigation systems but infrastructural works are also needed for the maintenance, saving, recovery and recycling of water by strengthening the network of reservoirs in the territories, creating basins and also using the former quarries to collect rainwater so as to collect it when there is too much of it and manage its use when needed.
Coldiretti’s advice to support Apulian companies so as not to fall into the deception of fake Made in Italy is to choose by carefully checking the label.
On bottles of extra virgin olive oil obtained from foreign olives on sale in supermarkets – adds Coldiretti – it is almost impossible in the vast majority of cases to read the words “blends of EU olive oils”, “blends of non-EU olive oils” or “blends of EU and non-EU olive oils” required by law on olive oil labels. The words – Coldiretti specifies – are written in very small characters, placed behind the bottle and, in many cases, in a position on the label that makes it difficult to see, so much so that consumers would have to shop with a magnifying glass to be able to choose consciously.
Sunday 30 June 2024
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