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Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

nature.com

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Re: Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

#181

Post by isolli »

vanderZwan wrote: post #53

People outside of Italy are probably not aware of how seriously they take the topic of olive oil over there. The label "extra vergine" increases the price so much that there is a huge economic incentive for fraud. To combat this they have a taste police (literally) that checks that olive oil samples are not secretly mixes of fresh and old oil together. They are... quite opinionated, as you can see this exchange from…

And the problem is not new: the Romans were already fighting olive-oil fraud!

From Olive Oil's Dark Side [0]: "The Romans instituted elaborate mechanisms to prevent fraud. [...] These careful records were intended to prevent the siphoning off of oil en route, or the substitution of an inferior product."

The whole article is very interesting!

[0] https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/olive-oils-dark-...

Re: Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

#182

Post by pif »

Cyph0n wrote: post #78
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is olive oil- it's just not extra virgin olive oil, produced by olive flesh (i.e. not the seeds) and only by mechanical extraction (i.e. no heat or chemical processing). The fraud is in the fact that it is advertised as extra virgin, the highest recognised quality, when it's not. Also, it is Italian, only not purely so. It is often mixed in with oils from other places. The problem is when the mix-ins are from Nort…

> The problem is when the mix-ins are from North Africa, e.g. from Morocco, which are considered of inferior quality Tunisian here. I'm curious: why is North African olive oil considered inferior?

Hello, Southern Italian here. I've never heard any bashing against North African olives or oil. Common sense says that olive is a Mediterranean tree and no particular Mediterranean region is better than all the others. On the other side, the issue raised against non-EU olives is that they are not subject to EU quality regulations, and those regulations are considered quite strict.

Re: Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

#183

Post by pif »

> Italy declared a state of emergency over the crisis in 2015. But quarantine efforts — which can involve uprooting beloved, ancient trees — have been opposed by environmentalists and some farmers,

That's always the problem with stupid environmentalists (as opposed to smart environmentalists): they can only say no, but they never propose an alternative solutions to the actual issue.

Re: Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

#184

Post by agumonkey »

chicob wrote: post #179
agumonkey wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting, do you think they improve yield and/or decrease workload ?

The irrigation controls have a direct and significant impact in yield. Other tools raise profitability by contributing to greater efficacy and less waste. The pH meter, for example, pretty much payed itself the first time it was used.

I'm asking because I was interested in reviving (at my scale) farming on my mother's caribbean island. Lots of space, sun and rain, but farming is still seen as a burden (remains of colonialism organization). I think there's a lot of things to be improved to make it both simpler, greener (ketone was used for decades there). Ultimately to give people back the amazing vegetables that grow there naturally and avoid importing low quality ones (also social benefits of people being in nature more).

Do you have advices or references to read about this ?

Re: Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

#185

Post by HelloNurse »

pif wrote: post #182
Cyph0n wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem is when the mix-ins are from North Africa, e.g. from Morocco, which are considered of inferior quality Tunisian here. I'm curious: why is North African olive oil considered inferior?

Hello, Southern Italian here. I've never heard any bashing against North African olives or oil. Common sense says that olive is a Mediterranean tree and no particular Mediterranean region is better than all the others. On the other side, the issue raised against non-EU olives is that they are not subject to EU quality regulations, and those regulations are considered quite strict.

Oil quality depends mostly on how it is produced; setting aside the possibility of contaminated product, olives from different places can only have a different taste.

Re: Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

#186

Post by pif »

syn0byte wrote: post #19
xbryanx wrote: post #11

Italy has a messy history listening to and even jailing its scientists, as they go about the normal process of empiricism. https://www.nature.com/news/italian-seismologists-cleared-of...

"Bertolaso said he was sending the scientists to L’Aquila to carry out “a media operation” in order to “shut up any imbecile,” most likely a reference to Gioacchino Giuliani, a technician at the nearby Gran Sasso physics laboratory who had reportedly raised a series of alarms about impending strong quakes in the weeks beforehand." Scientists, acting in a public service context, charged with negligence after a natural…

> they dismissed as unlikely

They didn't dismiss it! They only stated that imbecile Gioacchino Giuliani was talking out of nothing and people had better to ignore him.

Earthquakes cannot yet be foreseen with an adequate precision. Fullstop.

After the fact, judges were clearly overwhelmed with emotions when they forced themselves to read a mere pseudo-coincidence as an unknown genius researcher being silenced by the corrupt scientific elite. The judgement was overthrown in appeal, and the appeal outcome validated by supreme court, with the staement: il fatto non sussiste (there is no case).

Re: Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

#187

Post by Gravityloss »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #30
superflyguy wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, but this is unprecedented for a developed country. Yes, they were eventually cleared. Great. Some doubts remain but it cannot be proved beyond all reasonable doubt that they were witches. Not guilty!

I'm pretty sure the US is considered a developed country and it routinely ignores scientists' warnings about the climate and the environment in general.

Charles Monnett was grilled by agents about his research.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Monnett

Here's some original material:

https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/species/mammals/polar_be...

Re: Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

#188

Post by thrusong »

chicob wrote: post #23

I'm an olive and almond producer in Portugal. In preparation for this very serious issue, since that the only thing I can do is to minimize the risk of infection, I tell all personnel to spray bleach on trimming scissors for each tree, the case of high density orchards, and for every 10-15 trees (or each row) in super high density orchards. I also try to monitor for infection vectors like Cicadellidae, and for possib…

Lake Winnipeg, near Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, is the 11th largest fresh water lake in the world and became infected with zebra mussels in 2015. Already, things are looking bleak.

Re: Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

#189

Post by chicob »

agumonkey wrote: post #184
chicob wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The irrigation controls have a direct and significant impact in yield. Other tools raise profitability by contributing to greater efficacy and less waste. The pH meter, for example, pretty much payed itself the first time it was used.

I'm asking because I was interested in reviving (at my scale) farming on my mother's caribbean island. Lots of space, sun and rain, but farming is still seen as a burden (remains of colonialism organization). I think there's a lot of things to be improved to make it both simpler, greener (ketone was used for decades there). Ultimately to give people back the amazing vegetables that grow there naturally and avoid impo…

I know nothing about agriculture in the Caribbean, but I would suggest taking advantage of the local produce and starting there.

Do you have any ideas on what you want to grow?

I checked the Caribbean Agriculture Agricultural Research and Development's website (www.cardi.org) for some information. They have annual reports, that stop at 2011 for some reason. I would read some of them to get an idea of what are the current trends.

One idea that comes to mind after reading the 2011 report is producing high quality seeds. Grain prices for direct consumption are not as interesting.

I would also search for local farming associations to get to know what people are doing.

I suspect that the Caribbean will be more susceptible to climate change than other regions, so food security might become very important in a near future.

Good luck!

Re: Italy’s olive crisis intensifies as deadly tree disease spreads

#190

Post by agumonkey »

chicob wrote: post #189
agumonkey wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm asking because I was interested in reviving (at my scale) farming on my mother's caribbean island. Lots of space, sun and rain, but farming is still seen as a burden (remains of colonialism organization). I think there's a lot of things to be improved to make it both simpler, greener (ketone was used for decades there). Ultimately to give people back the amazing vegetables that grow there naturally and avoid impo…

I know nothing about agriculture in the Caribbean, but I would suggest taking advantage of the local produce and starting there. Do you have any ideas on what you want to grow? I checked the Caribbean Agriculture Agricultural Research and Development's website (www.cardi.org) for some information. They have annual reports, that stop at 2011 for some reason. I would read some of them to get an idea of what are the cur…

Mostly local indeed, but I don't think all local would make a fully balanced diet so maybe a few other things. If you step outside the road you can easily find trees loaded with varieties of oranges, citrus, coconuts, avocados .. I'd start with that and see for the rest

Many thanks for the links, I don't think I would have googled for that.

I will ask local farmers when I get the chance to, but few reports that I had by inhabitants is that .. farming is mostly avoided (laziness, pollution, whatever). To the point where they import things that used to grow locally from netherlands.

I'm also surprised about the climate change thing, I imagined a volcanic island to be too dynamic to be affected as much as, say, Europe.

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