For the people who are involved in the production and trade of Greek olive oil, this year will become a case study.
Climate has its own mind, and it has become more and more unstable. One of the recent effects was a very dry summer period which affected the average levels of production per hectare in Spain. Being the No1 olive oil producer, the decrease of 40% compared to the average annual volumes of the country translated into a very bad crop.
On the contrary Greece, the third biggest European producer of olive oil had one of the best yields in terms of volume. Despite the good crop volume, the climatic conditions unexpectedly affected the quality of the olive oil.
Greece produces due to the climatic conditions and the cultivated olive tree varieties crops with an analogy of 80% extra virgin and 20% virgin or low-quality olive oil. This year the analogy shifted to 50% – 50%.
The combination of the bad Spanish crop, the annual needs from Italian standardizers, and the reduced amount of Greek high-quality olive oil drove the prices at the very beginning of the olive crop from 3,50€ per kg to 5,30-5,40 €.
Today the prices are rotating around 5 to 5,20€/ kg but nobody can make a valid projection on the price levels at which Greek extra virgin will move until new crop.
The crucial and most important point is that available quantity of high quality Greek extra virgin olive oil is limited.