Young Croatian Grower Wins International Acclaim for Oil from Historic Grove

Summary

Croatian olive oil pro­ducer Stjepan Dević, aged 30, has been rec­og­nized at the NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition for his award-win­ning ​“Perliano” oil, show­cas­ing his ded­i­ca­tion and the unique ter­roir of his olive grove. Dević, who comes from a long line of olive grow­ers, also founded the Olive Pruning School in Dalmatia to share knowl­edge and exper­tise with other enthu­si­asts in the region, fur­ther solid­i­fy­ing his com­mit­ment to the olive oil com­mu­nity and the indus­try’s growth.

Croatian olive oil pro­duc­ers are once again prov­ing their met­tle on the global stage, and a young grower is lead­ing the charge with an award-win­ning oil steeped in his­tory. Stjepan Dević (30) from Sukošan near Zadar has earned inter­na­tional recog­ni­tion at the pres­ti­gious NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition (NYIOOC), a tes­ta­ment to his ded­i­ca­tion and the unique ter­roir of his olive grove.

Croatian olive oils are mak­ing waves at the 2025 NYIOOC. They hold a strong sec­ond place with an impres­sive 77 awards, closely trail­ing Italy’s 83 acco­lades with just over half of the results in, accord­ing to the sta­tus mon­i­tor on the Olive Oil Times World Ranking app. Particularly note­wor­thy is the grow­ing num­ber of young Croatian pro­duc­ers achiev­ing such high stan­dards, with Dević being a prime exam­ple.

“The feel­ing is unique. Indescribable. The award is the cul­mi­na­tion of my ten years of work and ded­i­ca­tion to olive grow­ing,” Dević shared with Olive Oil Times, reflect­ing on his achieve­ment.

His award-win­ning Perliano oil, crafted from Levantinka, Istrian Bjelica, and Leccina olive vari­eties, boasts a har­mo­nious pro­file. It is fresh with a medium inten­sity and presents attrac­tive, fruity notes of Mediterranean herbs, pep­per, green banana, arti­choke, and almond. Notably, the oil is also rich in polyphe­nols, which are known for their sig­nif­i­cant health ben­e­fits.

The olive grove that yields this excep­tional oil is located on a ter­raced hill in the for­mer medieval set­tle­ment of Prljane, Latin Perliano, from which the oil derives its name. This his­toric site car­ries a dra­matic past, hav­ing been dev­as­tated by Ottoman incur­sions and later suf­fer­ing fur­ther destruc­tion dur­ing the Serbian aggres­sion before its even­tual rebuild­ing after the Croatian Homeland War. Only the Church of St. Martin remains from the orig­i­nal set­tle­ment.

Dević’s con­nec­tion to olive grow­ing runs deep. His fam­ily has cul­ti­vated olives since 1640. He proudly car­ries on this tra­di­tion, ini­tially inspired by his ances­tors, who pro­duced oil using tra­di­tional meth­ods.

Driven by his pas­sion, Dević pur­sued for­mal edu­ca­tion in agri­cul­ture, earn­ing a mas­ter’s degree in agron­omy. He gained valu­able expe­ri­ence and even­tu­ally estab­lished his own busi­ness, Hortus Agro, which spe­cial­izes in land­scap­ing and land­scape main­te­nance. Leveraging the earn­ings from his grand­fa­ther’s land in Sukošan, he estab­lished his olive groves with 400 trees and later acquired an older grove, graft­ing in more native and intro­duced vari­eties.

“When you do what you love, and you love what you do, any­thing is pos­si­ble,” says Dević, encap­su­lat­ing his phi­los­o­phy.

Beyond oil pro­duc­tion, Dević has also become a cer­ti­fied taster with the Olea Zadar Association of Sensory Analysts of Olive Oil. In November of this year, he co-founded the Olive Pruning School in Dalmatia with Dr. Šimo Marcelić, demon­strat­ing his com­mit­ment to knowl­edge shar­ing.

“Our inten­tion is to con­nect sci­ence, pro­fes­sion and prac­tice. To trans­fer knowl­edge. Because, if knowl­edge is not trans­ferred, it is dead,” explains Dević. They have part­nered with young enthu­si­asts and gained exper­tise in Italy under the guid­ance of olive-grow­ing vision­ary Giorgio Pannellio, whose name graces the cur­rent Italian Olive Pruning School.

The school focuses on prun­ing using the poly­conic vase method. Dević high­lights the numer­ous advan­tages of this tech­nique over tra­di­tional spher­i­cal or bushy shapes, includ­ing a bet­ter ratio of wood and leaf mass, reduced fer­tile area, and more even fruit ripen­ing. This leads to improved har­vests and sig­nif­i­cantly lower har­vest­ing, prun­ing, and pro­tec­tion costs.

The Olive Pruning School’s courses have gar­nered inter­est not only from Dalmatian and other Croatian olive grow­ers but also from neigh­bor­ing coun­tries like Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro. ​“We are sat­is­fied with the response. Hundreds of par­tic­i­pants have already attended the courses,” states Dević.

Furthering his com­mit­ment to the olive oil com­mu­nity, Dević is orga­niz­ing the first prun­ing com­pe­ti­tion for the Dobroslav Elezović Trophy, hon­or­ing the founder of mod­ern olive grow­ing in Dalmatia.

“Competing and being bet­ter is in the blood of us Croats,” remarks Dević, draw­ing par­al­lels between sports and olive grow­ing. Alongside his part­ner, Toni Družijanić, they pruned an impres­sive 20,000 olive trees this sea­son alone.

Dević empha­sizes the ben­e­fits of the poly­conic vase in his own groves, not­ing that it ​“enables a bet­ter dis­tri­b­u­tion of light and air­flow between the trees, which con­tributes to a higher qual­ity of the fruits and the oil itself.”

He under­scores the impor­tance of har­vest­ing each olive vari­ety at its opti­mal time to achieve the high­est oil qual­ity. For his award-win­ning oil, he picked at the begin­ning of October when the first oil mills opened.

Expanding his ven­tures, Dević is also involved in olive tourism. His hol­i­day home, Villa Perliano, offers vis­i­tors the oppor­tu­nity to expe­ri­ence award-win­ning olive oils, par­tic­i­pate in tast­ings, and explore the olive groves. The villa is con­ve­niently located just a 12-minute walk from the renowned Zlatna luka beach, 5 kilo­me­ters from the air­port, and near the his­toric city of Zadar, con­sid­ered older than Rome.

When asked about the secret behind the suc­cess of Dalmatian and Croatian olive grow­ers, Dević attrib­utes it to the ​“unique ter­roir,” the soil and earth that enhance the taste and aroma of the native region, as well as the diverse olive vari­eties. He also high­lights the impor­tance of the karst land­scape, stat­ing, ​“the olive gives its best when it is most dif­fi­cult.”

Dević is opti­mistic about Croatian olive grow­ers’ per­for­mance in this year’s NYIOOC com­pe­ti­tion. ​“I hope that we will keep sec­ond place, and for more than that, they should par­tic­i­pate in the NYIOOC with more sam­ples. Because, for exam­ple, Italy this year has 255 sam­ples, and Croatia has 143. If we had the same num­ber of sam­ples, maybe they could be the over­all cham­pi­ons in terms of the num­ber of prizes won,” he con­cludes.

The young olive grower con­tin­ues to receive con­grat­u­la­tions for his New York suc­cess. Ivica Vlatković, a mul­ti­ple award-win­ning olive grower and pres­i­dent of the Association of Zadar County Olive Growers, wrote to him, ​“Well done, Stjepan. This great award is an impor­tant incen­tive for you and Sukošan.” Dević’s achieve­ment high­lights his ded­i­ca­tion and under­scores the grow­ing rep­u­ta­tion of Croatian olive oil on the global stage.