Olive Farmers in Alentejo Seek Sustainable Certification Label

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A group of approx­i­mately 20 olive oil pro­duc­ers from the south­ern Portuguese region of Alentejo is join­ing the new sus­tain­able olive farm­ing devel­op­ment project recently launched by Olivum, a pro­duc­ers’ asso­ci­a­tion, and the University of Èvora.

The Alentejo Olive Oil Sustainability Program (PSAA) extends to all areas of olive oil pro­duc­tion. It aims to shrink the industry’s envi­ron­men­tal foot­print in the country’s largest olive oil-pro­duc­ing region while increas­ing its social and eco­nomic ones.

A new man­age­ment tool will also be devel­oped to pro­mote and mon­i­tor the sus­tain­able per­for­mance of Alentejo olive oil to increase the com­pet­i­tive­ness of the local indus­try.

The project pro­mot­ers empha­sized how the final goal of PSAA is to pro­duce a rec­og­niz­able and author­i­ta­tive cer­ti­fi­ca­tion or qual­ity label that proves the sus­tain­able approach of the cer­ti­fied com­pa­nies and would be rec­og­nized both nation­ally and inter­na­tion­ally.

“PSAA aims to cre­ate a sus­tain­abil­ity bench­mark, in its envi­ron­men­tal, social and eco­nomic dimen­sions, for the pro­duc­tion of Alentejo olive oil,” Pedro Lopes, pres­i­dent of the board of direc­tors of Olivum, told Olive Oil Times.

“This bench­mark will help strengthen the sec­tor’s entre­pre­neur­ial capac­ity, improv­ing its per­for­mance and effi­ciency in the use of resources, its pro­duc­tiv­ity and value cre­ation,” he added.

The pro­jec­t’s sig­nif­i­cance is highly related to the region’s role in the last few years in Portugal’s olive oil sec­tor, with invest­ments in mod­ern grow­ing and milling tech­niques and infra­struc­ture that have con­tributed to the steady growth of the coun­try’s coun­try’s olive oil out­put.

Spanish firm Juan Vilar Strategic Consulting esti­mates that 50 per­cent of the Portuguese olive indus­try is located in the Alentejo region.

According to International Olive Council data, Portuguese olive oil pro­duc­tion has steadily grown over the past decade, ris­ing from 76,200 tons in the 2011/2012 sea­son to the 120,000 tons expected for the cur­rent sea­son.

However, Olivum offi­cials believe the cur­rent IOC esti­mate to be on the con­ser­v­a­tive side and expect pro­duc­tion to reach 180,000 tons in 2021/22.

According to Juan Vilar Strategic Consulting data, Portugal’s olive oil sec­tor gen­er­ates a turnover of about €470 mil­lion per year and pro­vides 6.6 mil­lion work­ing days.

“Recent stud­ies show that cur­rent mar­ket demands are related to sus­tain­abil­ity, ori­gin and form of pro­duc­tion in envi­ron­men­tal and social aspects,” Lopes said. ​“Therefore, the main chal­lenge for the sec­tor is to win over more con­sumers and more mar­kets that value these prac­tices. That’s why the cre­ation of the PSAA is so impor­tant.”

“Another major chal­lenge is pro­mot­ing the image and value of sus­tain­able Alentejo olive oil, which will have to go through an intel­li­gent mar­ket­ing and com­mu­ni­ca­tion strat­egy,” he added.

For a com­pany to be rec­og­nized by the PSAA as sus­tain­able, it will have to com­ply with a range of require­ments in its oper­a­tions in the grove or mill.

Maria Raquel Lucas, the project’s coor­di­na­tor and a pro­fes­sor at the University of Èvora, told Olive Oil Times that each para­me­ter would be asso­ci­ated with a min­i­mum ref­er­ence level of sus­tain­abil­ity.

According to Lucas, local pro­duc­ers should work together to achieve a more par­tic­i­pa­tive and inclu­sive approach to grasp the full spec­trum of the specifics of the indus­try and the oppor­tu­ni­ties deriv­ing from coop­er­a­tion.

Such an approach would fos­ter ​“a favor­able envi­ron­ment for the com­pet­i­tive­ness and added value chain and for the wide and intel­li­gent com­mu­ni­ca­tion, dis­sem­i­na­tion and pro­mo­tion of the olive oil sus­tain­abil­ity pro­gram and its prin­ci­ples,” she said.

“It is very impor­tant that Alentejo olive oil can com­mu­ni­cate more and bet­ter the good prac­tices that already exist on envi­ron­men­tal, social, and eco­nomic issues, which greatly impact the Alentejo region,” she added.

“The sec­tor is strongly com­mit­ted to new tech­nolo­gies and renew­able ener­gies so that olive groves and mills are eco­nom­i­cally and envi­ron­men­tally more sus­tain­able, while at the same time encour­ag­ing employ­ment and the instal­la­tion of new com­pa­nies with knowl­edge and tech­nol­ogy in the region,” Lucas con­tin­ued.

The first steps for PSAA will include the adop­tion of an olive oil pro­duc­tion sus­tain­abil­ity bench­mark and eval­u­at­ing the per­for­mance of the pilot group of pro­duc­ers. Best prac­tices from this first step will then be shared.

PSAA will also lay the foun­da­tion for devel­op­ing the Digital Sustainability Program.

“All the infor­ma­tion and con­tri­bu­tions from the pilot group will be used to develop [the plat­form],” Lopes said.

“This is a pro­ce­dure and a strat­egy based on actions requir­ing low invest­ment from the mem­bers, yield­ing fast return­ing ben­e­fits,” Lucas added. ​“This is a method of con­tin­u­ous improve­ment which allows mem­bers to develop and imple­ment the pro­gram at their own speed.”

Lopes and Lucas empha­sized how the PSAA model can eas­ily be applied to other sec­tors and coun­tries.

“PSAA is a tool for sus­tain­abil­ity, which is why it is designed, planned and struc­tured to be imple­mented in any sec­tor, region or coun­try, accord­ing to the con­text of each oper­a­tor,” Lopes said. ​“We aim to make the PSAA and the sus­tain­abil­ity of Alentejo olive oil an inter­na­tional ref­er­ence in the field of sus­tain­abil­ity.”

“The def­i­n­i­tion of the cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process accord­ing to which the recog­ni­tion of the Alentejo olive oil for their sus­tain­abil­ity per­for­mance will hap­pen, avoid­ing expo­sure to rep­u­ta­tion risks, will be another fol­low­ing project,” Lucas con­cluded.

• A Planície
• Juan Vilar Strategic Consultants