Alarm in Gargano as Xylella Reaches New Northern Front

Summary

A new out­break of Xylella fas­tidiosa has been detected in Puglia, Italy, with 47 olive trees found infected near Cagnano Varano, lead­ing to the imple­men­ta­tion of con­tain­ment mea­sures and genetic char­ac­ter­i­za­tion of the bac­terium by CNR researchers. The out­break has caused con­cern among local author­i­ties and farm­ing asso­ci­a­tions, as efforts are made to slow down the spread of the infec­tion and develop new solu­tions to com­bat the deadly Olive Quick Decline Syndrome.

A fresh out­break of Xylella fas­tidiosa has been reported in the north­ern reaches of Puglia, south­ern Italy, where the bac­terium had pre­vi­ously been unde­tected.

Forty-seven olive trees were found infected near Cagnano Varano, in the heart of Gargano National Park, a region also known as the spur of Italy.

The dis­cov­ery sounded the alarm for local author­i­ties, researchers, and vol­un­teers, who are now team­ing up to fully assess the pres­ence of the bac­te­ria within a 400-meter radius of the out­break.

Containment mea­sures are being imple­mented in accor­dance with the estab­lished pro­to­cols pro­vided by Italian law and European reg­u­la­tions.

Those mea­sures include the erad­i­ca­tion of the infected trees and all other trees found within a 50-meter radius of the out­break.

Such a red zone is sur­rounded by a buffer area of at least 2.5 kilo­me­ters from the infec­tion. Within that area, spe­cial mon­i­tor­ing and pre­ven­tion pro­to­cols are deployed.

According to analy­ses con­ducted by the National Research Council (CNR), the Xylella fas­tidiosa sub­species pauca was detected in the trees.

CNR sci­en­tists are now genet­i­cally char­ac­ter­iz­ing the bac­terium to deter­mine its exact pro­file and pos­si­ble ori­gin.

Pauca is con­sid­ered the pri­mary trig­ger of the deadly Olive Quick Decline Syndrome, which destroyed mil­lions of olive trees in south­ern Puglia.

The new out­break is about 90 kilo­me­ters north of the last major infec­tion reported last July.

Furthermore, the Park is nearly 300 kilo­me­ters north of where pauca was first dis­cov­ered by CNR researchers back in 2013.

In Foggia province, where the new out­break was detected, tens of thou­sands of olive farm­ers remain active, pro­duc­ing roughly 15 per­cent of the region’s olive oil out­put.

Even in the midst of the Xylella infec­tion, which drove huge num­bers of farms and olive oil mills out of the mar­ket, Puglia is still by far the major olive oil-pro­duc­ing region in the coun­try.

“We are deeply con­cerned. The arrival of the bac­terium in this part of Puglia, so far com­pletely unaf­fected, seems to indi­cate an accel­er­a­tion in its spread,” said Gennaro Sicolo, regional pres­i­dent of CIA Agricoltori Italiani.

“Just a few days ago, we had reported the increas­ingly alarm­ing sit­u­a­tion of Xylella’s advance near Bari, and now we find it in the province of Foggia,” he added.

In the area, some of Italy’s most famous olive tree cul­ti­vars are grown, such as Coratina and Peranzana.

“A severe blow,” com­mented the Apulian branch of the farm­ing asso­ci­a­tion Coldiretti, not­ing that no cure for the bac­te­rio­sis is cur­rently avail­able.

“The only way to slow the spread of the infec­tion,” Coldiretti wrote, ​“is mechan­i­cal and phy­tosan­i­tary pre­ven­tion prac­tices, plant mon­i­tor­ing beyond visual inspec­tions, sur­veil­lance of the insect vec­tor known as the spit­tle­bug, sam­pling and removal of infected olive trees and the use of new tools for the early detec­tion of out­breaks.”

Slowing down the infec­tion is con­sid­ered cru­cial to give researchers time to develop new solu­tions and for the indus­try to adopt them and bring them to mar­ket.

Recently, the E.U.-funded large and col­lab­o­ra­tive Biovexo project announced that three sus­tain­able bio-pes­ti­cides have proven their abil­ity to cur­tail the infec­tion and reduce its impact on the trees.

Previously, other on-field tri­als demon­strated how a cer­tain level of resilience to the bac­te­ria can be achieved.

According to CIA Agricoltori Italiani, more should be done. The asso­ci­a­tion once again requested the appoint­ment of a spe­cial com­mis­sioner to expe­dite actions on the ter­ri­tory through increased fund­ing and col­lab­o­ra­tion among stake­hold­ers.

In his note, Sicolo also noted that, in recent years, many invest­ments have been made by olive farm­ers in Foggia province.

“New pro­duc­tion processes have improved not only the qual­ity of the prod­uct but also its envi­ron­men­tal and eco­nomic sus­tain­abil­ity,” he said.

“Numerous olive-grow­ing busi­nesses have expe­ri­enced a gen­er­a­tional renewal that has allowed young women and men to take lead­ing roles in their fam­ily enter­prises, intro­duc­ing impor­tant inno­va­tions in mar­ket­ing and in the expan­sion into new mar­kets,” he con­cluded.