The olivicultores Valencian perceive this campaign the worst prices of the last decade

The Valencian producers of olive oil are perceiving in the present campaign the worst prices of the last decade and already drag four consecutive seasons selling his olives underneath of the costs of production. Although the harvest has diminished with regard to the year happened in the Valencian regions (especially in the Channel of Navarrés), the cotizaciones do not raise the flight because of the disequilibrium between offer and demand that exists in the rest of Spain. The national offer of oil beats historical maxima to every year that happens, so that the existences in the almazaras already reach the figure of 1.280.000 tonnes.

The Valencian Association of Agriculturalists (AVA-ASAJA) warn that the activation in February of the private storage of oil has not resulted sufficient to trace back the prices. The president of AVA-ASAJA, Cristóbal Aguado, attributes this failure to the scarce number of commercial operators that have been able to take advantage of this European mechanism allocated to withdraw excedentes of the market and to that the agreed prices under this formula have not surpassed the 0,65 euros by tonne and day, when in the previous storage, authorised by the European Union (EU) in November, situated in 1,30 euros. Thus, Aguado demands to the EU that allocate the bottoms announced that they have not arrived to use to activate another storage since “it is the optimum moment to combat the excess of offer and like this can face the next weeks with better commercial perspectives”. To half and long term, Aguado demands the introduction of structural measures and a greater concentration of the offer (through the reform of the PAC 2014-2020), as well as improve the commercialisation under a mark Spain that agglutinate to all the national oils.

The price in origin of the virgin oil keeps from three months ago underneath of the threshold of reference that requires to activate the private storage (1,71 /kg). In words of Aguado, “the crisis oleícola has arrived until such extreme that the Valencian producers are earning this campaign the same prices that there was ten years ago, with the big difference that now the costs of production have duplicated because of the encarecimiento of the diesel, the fertilizantes and the hand of work”. According to sources of the sector, the drought will not avoid that Spain reach this year the greater production of his history.