"Oil producers in Italy face challenges such as Xylella as they seek to promote product quality and sustainability"

What is the situation of the olive oil producers in Italy? what are the main challenges they have to afford?

Italian olive growing is complex because it has a thousand facets, each with its own characteristics and problems. A common concern is climate change and its impact on olive productivity, year after year but also in the long term. Then there are the hotspots. Xylella in Apulia, which should become a European problem, continues its advance northwards, almost in the face of general indifference. The progressive abandonment of olive groves, especially in the marginal areas of central Italy. The salinisation of water tables and the risk of desertification of some important areas, especially in Puglia and Sicily. These are challenges of the times that must be faced and overcome.

What are the most important initiatives that Italia Olivícola is implementing to strengthen the olive oi food chain?

CIA Agricoltori Italiani is first and foremost stimulating policy on the main challenges facing Italian olive growing. We have been calling for a national olive plan and we have found a sensitive and attentive interlocutor in the Undersecretary for Agricultural Policy responsible for olive oil, Patrizio La Pietra. We also believe in the synergy of the supply chain, having created the FOOI interprofession as a means of balancing relations, including economic relations, between the various actors. Thus was born the Ethical Pact, which brings together the most representative acronyms of the sector, for an olive-growing system that guarantees fair remuneration for all, but above all a high quality extra virgin olive oil for the consumer. We then spoke to many olive grower friends from all over the Mediterranean, so that differences are not a cause for division.

How has consumer perception of olive oil evolved in Italy and in the world, and is demand shifting towards healthier olive oil?

The Covid19 pandemic has changed people's approach to many aspects of life, including food. People consume less but better. This also applies to extra virgin olive oil. It is not necessarily a bad thing that consumption of extra virgin olive oil has gone from 10 to just over 8 litres/capita/year in Italy, if quality and consumer awareness have increased. Extra virgin olive oil is not a fat or vegetable oil like any other. We strongly oppose a commodity vision, which I have often referred to as Coca Cola oil. Oil is scarce, and with climate change perhaps even more so, and precious. Devaluing it makes no sense; on the contrary, it must be valued. Every citizen of the world has only 0.33 litres of olive oil.

In addition, you are also the vice presidente of the Advisory Committe of the IOC, how do you see the olive oil consumption from this perspective?

The experience of being vice-president of the IOC Advisory Committee is very valuable, for me personally but also for the association I represent. It is a useful moment of confrontation with other sensibilities and perspectives. In the future I believe there are only opportunities for olive oil. When it is of high quality, it is a healthy and good product. The main challenge, I think, is to make young people understand it. People of my generation know this, but young people do not always have this awareness, attracted by more cosmopolitan food models. Extra virgin olive oil must also come out of an ethnic gastronomic vision, only suitable for Mediterranean recipes.

To end, you've got an important european promotion project for the next years. Could you please explain what are you going to do and the objetives?

The dissemination of an olive oil culture based on quality, typicity, traceability and sustainability will be the priority of the next promotional actions. Meeting with consumers and professionals to make them perceive the value of these key elements for the olive growing of the future, illustrating why an extra virgin olive oil of these characteristics has a higher cost but also greater benefits for the individual and society.