Third 'Monna Oliva' Crowns Best Italian Table Olives

Summary

The Monna Oliva com­pe­ti­tion, orga­nized by UMAO, brought together 100 high-qual­ity Italian table olive pro­duc­ers to show­case their prod­ucts and dis­cuss growth strate­gies in a com­pet­i­tive mar­ket. The event has seen increas­ing par­tic­i­pa­tion over the years, high­light­ing the grow­ing pop­u­lar­ity and con­sump­tion of table olives world­wide.

Monna Oliva is a unique com­pe­ti­tion ded­i­cated to the best table olives, orga­nized by the Mediterranean Union of Oil Tasters UMAO. One hun­dred high-qual­ity Italian pro­duc­ers got together with their efforts, expe­ri­ence and pro­fes­sion­al­ism at the third edi­tion of the event that has become a valu­able ref­er­ence point for the sec­tor and an oppor­tu­nity to look closely at the national pro­duc­tion, exam­ine issues related to the pro­duc­tion of table olives, and find new growth strate­gies to face more and more com­pet­i­tive mar­kets.

“The num­ber of par­tic­i­pants has increased from year to year,” said Paola Fioravanti, pres­i­dent of UMAO and chair­man of the sci­en­tific com­mit­tee of the com­pe­ti­tion. ​“The suc­cess of the event comes both from pro­duc­ers, which found a way to pro­mote and pub­li­cize their prod­ucts, both from the oper­a­tors who want to know them bet­ter.”

“Table olives, which for a while were set aside and over­shad­owed by olive oil, pro­gres­sively attracted greater inter­est, and in the last 25 years, accord­ing to data of the International Olive Council, con­sump­tion increased by 173 per­cent,” Fioravanti noted.

In fact, for their ease of use and abun­dant vari­eties which cor­re­spond to dif­fer­ent tastes, olives con­tinue to gain in pop­u­lar­ity world­wide: Between 1991 and 2016, con­sump­tion has increased 2.8 times, from a lit­tle less than 1.000.000 tons to more than 2.650.000 tons.

Monna Oliva com­bined pro­mo­tion and the dis­sem­i­na­tion of knowl­edge of table olives, which are closely linked to their pro­duc­tion areas, in order to tie envi­ron­ment, tourism, con­sump­tion and pro­duc­tion into a vir­tu­ous plot.

Tests were con­ducted in Rome by rec­og­nized experts led by panel leader Ivano Caprioli at the head­quar­ters of UMAO, and the award cer­e­mony, which is orga­nized every year in a dif­fer­ent Italian region, took place on June 25 in Ascoli Piceno (Marche), the birth­place of the Ascolana Tenera del Piceno (con­sumed either directly or stuffed and fried, accord­ing to the spec­i­fi­ca­tion for the PDO cer­ti­fi­ca­tion obtained in 2005).

The con­test was accom­pa­nied by events related to the pro­duc­tion of table olives, which high­lighted the excel­lence of a prod­uct respect­ful of tra­di­tion but open to new tech­nolo­gies to improve qual­ity.

“The Italian prod­uct has reached such a high qual­ity that the board had to work hard to find the win­ners,” pointed out Fioravanti. ​“All pro­ducer regions reached great results, like Marche that hosted the event, Sicily, Sardinia that had been often on the podium, Apulia and Latium with its great Itrana. I hope that this com­pe­ti­tion, once sta­bi­lized on Italian pro­duc­tion, will cross Italian bor­ders and meet table olives com­ing from the Mediterranean basin and over­seas coun­tries.”

You can find the win­ners and their web­site on the Monna Oliva web­site.

• Olivo e Olio


• Corriere del Vino