Is my olive farmer extracting the urine?

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pentaqua-new
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Is my olive farmer extracting the urine?

Postby pentaqua-new » Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:32 am

We have 24 mature trees - the largest has a girth of 3m and the smallest a girth of 2m. This year, when he was collecting the fruit he said it was a good year with much aceite. A month later when I see him, he says that he can only offer 5 litres of oil because he has "high expenses" - a new Discovery perhaps.

Anyone know approx what weight one ought to get off a typical tree (yes, I know the term "how long is a piece of string") and how that weight connects into volume of oil?

For the previous three years when we were just flitting across from time to time, we never pressed the issue and never bothered chasing him for the oil. Now that we live here we would like a "fare return" -whatever that is.

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spanish_lad
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Postby spanish_lad » Wed Feb 28, 2007 1:01 pm

my neibours have their own trees, and they say they get €1 / kilo for the "fresh" olives.

i dont know how many olives, or kilos of olives you need to get one litre of oil tho ??

Beachcomber
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Postby Beachcomber » Wed Feb 28, 2007 1:57 pm

When I was keeping an eye on a friends plot before he came to live here he asked me to arrange for the trees to be tended and collection of the olives. I don't know how many trees there were, certainly less than twenty four and not as mature as yours.

The final result was that the olive farmer who looked after the trees and collected the crop gave me 60 litres of first press olive oil (I hadn't asked him for any) and kept the same amount for himself and sold the remainder at a good price.

olive
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Postby olive » Wed Feb 28, 2007 2:09 pm

Lets say for a moment that you get 50 Kg per tree for an average year and that the euro a kilo is right ( I think it is on the high side) then you are looking at 1200 euros. If you tended them yourself then you (as a couple) would spend around three weeks harvesting them, maybe another three man weeks keeping weeds down, pruning and clearing the ground around the bases. You would have to find an outlet and get them there. Pay tax on the proceeds and pay Autonomos each month. Then you would need nets, poles and other kit, oh and fertiliser and pest control. The net result is you would be lucky to make anything each year and you would have much less leisure time.

Far better to take the oil on offer! You may try negotiating a better deal for next year (say 10 litros) but run the risk of him saying you do them. You also need to factor in the non tangible benefits. e.g. Your land looks tidy, trees get pruned, less disease and no doubt you get fresh veg and fruit donations to boot.

One final thought, He is probably still getting the fabulous EU grant on your trees. Last year that may have been as much as 24 euros in total. It will probably be less this year!

olive

Heston
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olive farmer

Postby Heston » Wed Feb 28, 2007 5:44 pm

Hi I have the same amount of trees you have last year my husband and i harvested them ourselves it took us about three days ( and nearly cost us a divorce!) however there was a shortage of olives last year due to the bad winter the year before (well in Jaen area anyway) we received 1.33euro per Kilo last year and averaged 95 kilos per tree. This year we paid two guys 50euros each (the going rate) they did them all in a day however the rate per Kilo was much lower this year and we only got 70cents per Kilo.
The rate changes daily throughout the season but dosnt fluctuate massively......to be honest just look after them yourself you have a small about. The nets are cheap and so are the poles it can be fun and you only need to prune them every two years and we didnt feed ours and had the biggest ones on the mountain! (perhaps I should have tried to sell them off as Organic!)


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