Revitalizing Salento: Entrepreneurs Fight Xylella with New Ideas

Summary

In Puglia, a new gen­er­a­tion of entre­pre­neurs is revi­tal­iz­ing the area dev­as­tated by Xylella fas­tidiosa by repur­pos­ing wood from dead olive trees for con­struc­tion, dec­o­ra­tion, and art, while also replant­ing olive orchards with resilient vari­eties. The OlivaMi asso­ci­a­tion sup­ports local farm­ers by replant­ing trees in affected areas, pro­vid­ing adopters with olive oil, and trans­form­ing wood from affected trees into unique prod­ucts, all while uti­liz­ing tech­nol­ogy for refor­esta­tion and land enhance­ment.

In the south­ern Italian region of Puglia, a new gen­er­a­tion of entre­pre­neurs is fight­ing against the decline of the area dev­as­tated by Xylella fas­tidiosa over the last ten years.

“We are work­ing toward a new begin­ning, bring­ing fresh energy and ideas to this land and my grandfather’s olive farm,” said Lapo Pignatelli, owner of La Falca.

Pignatelli’s olive farm is located in the heart of Salento, the Apulian region hard­est hit by Xylella fas­tidiosa.

Paradoxically, the far­m’s revi­tal­iza­tion is funded by the same trees that dried up after being infected by the bac­terium.

“When I returned to the farm after years of absence, the land­scape had com­pletely changed. Our cen­turies-old olive trees had died or were dying, and they had to be removed,” Pignatelli said.

During the removal oper­a­tions, new ideas emerged. ​“I couldn’t bear that all that mag­nif­i­cent wood, which nur­tured our land for cen­turies, would just be destroyed,” Pignatelli said.

“All of this needed a dif­fer­ent approach. So, I decided to buy a sawmill to recover this wood, and that’s essen­tially where it all began,” he added.

This is how Tàccaru was founded, a com­pany within the farm that processes dead olive trees and pro­duces wood suit­able for con­struc­tion, dec­o­ra­tion, design and art. Last year, Tàccaru con­tributed €30,000 of rev­enue to the com­pany.

“We spoke with experts from the National Research Council, and they explained that dead wood can­not trans­mit Xylella fas­tidiosa and is com­pletely safe,” Pignatelli said.

Meanwhile, new regional reg­u­la­tions allowed the reuse of a sig­nif­i­cant vol­ume of high-qual­ity wood from removed olive trees.

“This wood has extra­or­di­nary qual­i­ties. Its grain makes it visu­ally strik­ing; it’s hard, durable and nat­u­rally antibac­te­r­ial. It already has its niche mar­ket among tim­ber enthu­si­asts,” Pignatelli said.

Other reg­u­la­tions and ini­tia­tives enable locals to plant new olive orchards based on four olive vari­eties that are resilient to Xylella fas­tidiosa: Leccino, Favolosa, Lecciana and Leccio del Corno.

Pignatelli’s farm has restarted olive cul­ti­va­tion, begin­ning with five hectares of Favolosa and Leccino. ​“Then we learned about Lecciana, which can also be grown inten­sively,” he noted.

“One of our biggest chal­lenges is the lack of work­force. We needed a fresh start with tech­nol­ogy and mech­a­niza­tion,” Pignatelli explained.

As a result, new high-den­sity orchards have been planted, groves that a small team can man­age effi­ciently.

“If you want spe­cial­ized work­ers who stay with you long-term, you need to offer more than just sea­sonal employ­ment,” Pignatelli said.

Thus, the Tàccaru project helps the farm retain employ­ees, who split their time between the orchards and the sawmill.

“We will soon invest in oleo­tourism,” Pignatelli added, hint­ing at ren­o­va­tion work cur­rently under­way at the family’s his­toric farm­house.

“Many young entre­pre­neurs are restart­ing from sim­i­lar points, replant­ing olive trees. There’s a new energy in the area,” he said. ​“This sea­son, we hope for our first real olive har­vest. Of course, we remain at the mercy of the weather.”

Similar enthu­si­asm dri­ves the project ini­ti­ated by the OlivaMi asso­ci­a­tion, aim­ing to breathe new life into wood har­vested from Xylella-affected trees while revi­tal­iz­ing the olive econ­omy.

“The orig­i­nal idea behind OlivaMi came from British tourists who fell in love with Salento. They saw our region become increas­ingly dark­ened and sad year after year due to Xylella,” Chiara Nocco, com­mu­nity man­ager at OlivaMi, told Olive Oil Times.

The OlivaMi project began its ini­tial fundrais­ing round in January 2022 to help replant trees in Salento’s affected areas.

“The asso­ci­a­tion pro­motes adopt­ing olive vari­eties resilient to Xylella,” Nocco said. For each tree adopted, the asso­ci­a­tion pro­vides the adopter with one liter of extra vir­gin olive oil.

“We label each adopted tree with the adopter’s name, the tree’s name and a unique adop­tion code,” Nocco explained.

Funds raised sup­port local farm­ers who care for these trees and finance plant­ing new orchards through­out the region.

“Since 2022, more than 25,000 peo­ple have par­tic­i­pated in the project, over 200 com­pa­nies actively con­tribute and more than 40,000 olive trees have been donated to over 250 olive farm­ers,” Nocco said.

“The wood from the olive trees affected by Xylella, which are now being erad­i­cated, rep­re­sents an impor­tant resource that can have a valu­able sec­ond life,” she added.

“We’ve col­lab­o­rated with local arti­sans to trans­form some of this wood into unique items that tell the story of our territory’s resilience,” she said.

OlivaMi’s online shop fea­tures a wide range of prod­ucts crafted from olive wood and other pieces used to cre­ate plaques dis­play­ing the names and logos of col­lab­o­rat­ing com­pa­nies.

“Our mis­sion is to trans­form and give value to every part of the olive tree, main­tain­ing a strong con­nec­tion between nature, tra­di­tion and inno­va­tion,” Nocco empha­sized.

“Our asso­ci­a­tion was estab­lished to sup­port small landown­ers who cul­ti­vate olives out of pas­sion, pre­serv­ing tra­di­tions handed down from our par­ents and grand­par­ents,” she added. ​“People with­out assis­tance from the state or the European Union.”

Small landown­ers in Salento can con­tact the asso­ci­a­tion through a request form on its web­site.

“All the trees donated so far have been pur­chased with funds raised through adop­tions by fam­i­lies, busi­nesses, or through cel­e­bra­tory gifts,” Nocco said.

OlivaMi’s mem­bers are com­mit­ted to employ­ing the lat­est tech­nolo­gies in the field and busi­ness devel­op­ment.

“Technological inno­va­tion is cru­cial for refor­esta­tion and land enhance­ment, mak­ing the processes more effi­cient, sus­tain­able and eas­ier to mon­i­tor,” Nocco said.

The asso­ci­a­tion uti­lizes advanced pre­ci­sion agri­cul­ture tools to mon­i­tor tree health, opti­mize irri­ga­tion and pre­vent poten­tial dis­eases.

“Blockchain tech­nol­ogy also plays an impor­tant role,” Nocco said. ​“We launched a spin-off project, Carborea, which enables us to gen­er­ate and cer­tify car­bon cred­its from new olive plant­i­ngs.”

According to the asso­ci­a­tion, tech­nol­ogy is piv­otal in shap­ing a brighter future for the region. ​“It also makes the process more engag­ing, help­ing us involve younger gen­er­a­tions,” Nocco con­cluded.