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<pre>The article 'Stress & Water Problems For Australian Olive Groves' as
published in the Australian Olive Grower issue 18 should be mandatory
reading for all olive growers. This quarterly journal is published by
the nursery Olives Australia and whilst is commercial they are to be
congratulated on the reporting of comments made by Mohamed El-Kholy. Mr
El-Kholy made a tour of many olive groves in Australia from Queensland
to West Australia, a huge undertaking by any measures. Observations were
made through test holes and a huge amount of records have been made.
Some extracts of the article are as follows,

'Optimism for the olive industry is out of balance with the healthy
pessimism, which should exist, in a new industry. Some hard thinking has
to be done over the next few years if the industry is to be saved from
disaster.'

'At least 95% of the trees we saw were under terrible water stress.
Almost 98% of the trees have a very shallow root system starting only
25mm below ground and diminishing at a maximum of 150mm.'

'The management practice allowing this shows a complete misunderstanding
of the fact that olives are often characterised as shallow rooted trees.'

'In Australia, investment into irrigation networks is nothing but money
down the drain if the situation is to continue.'

'(However) unless the industry urgently addresses problems relating to
water stress, root management and tree shape training during the first
three years after planting, it will suffer the fate of all who allow
their blind optimism to over ride their healthy pessimism.'

There has already been considerable qualified advice given to proper
ground preparation and orchard management. However, unqualified
conflicting comments from various sources has somewhat muddied the
waters contributing to the general confusion. Growers continue with a
haphazard treatment of the 'symptoms' without the commitment to properly
addressing the 'disease.'

Roger Farquhar Hunter Valley

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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<pre>Well said, Roger.

Yet we do think most of us, ages ago, arrived at a state of healthy pessimism.

In the beginning, it was easy, perhaps too easy, to be optimistic, what
with the promulgation by some parties of literature and spoken advice full
of grand promises, grand yields, and grand business plans.

But we do recommend you treat with the very same healthy pessimism some of
the things that have been said, and are still being said, in the Australian
Olive Grower. We would like to see such journals (journal for us has
connotations of refereed content) published by independent bodies.

All the best.

Ian Fraser & Jenny Davidson
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<pre>Dear All

I am back from my travels in Crete and Italy and especially the
conference in Bari where some 400 of us talked about olives for 5 days
solid.

I have not had the opportunity to read the article in the Olive Grower
as yet. Like Australia similar questions are being addressed. One of
which is the accurate identification and performance of cultivars. It
was patently clear that the DNA technolgy is questionable and no
industry standard exists. Also the morphlogical features of trees and
fruit are still very important in the identification of varieties.
Authentification of olive oils was also on the agenda. Techniques from
examination of cloudy residues with DNA technology to Gas Chromatography
of the fatty acids and other minor components to Nuclear Magnetic
Resonance of whole oils to typify the regions and cultivars.

Sounds like hi-tech compared to the stress in the trees and the shallow
roots.

However at the end of the end I have no doubt that Australian growers
will be proficient in producing quality olives! What I see is the main
problem will be the marketing of the olives and olive oil. Towards this
the Italians my interpretation is that they have made the right moves.
Maybe there is a lesson here.

¥ firstly they they are unable to physically produce the volumes of
olive oil of Spain, Tunisia and soon Argentina that are needed for the
export markets.

¥ they appear to have then concentrated on the quality end of olive oil
- their flagships - Tuscany, Umbria and Liguria

¥ now even the Italian growers who have traditionally produced the bulk
of the Italian Oil - Apulia, Calabria and Sicily are talking of
improving the quality of their oil if they are to survive - at one farm
the owner was talking of the higher grades within the extra virgin grade

¥ Much of the effort is now not in growing olives - but the technology
associated with food standards ie chemical quality, purity, trueness to
label, blending etc. and the marketing and distribution

¥ the net result is that the Italian Olive industry can handle both its
own olive oil and that of others.

The subject of genetic engineering was not on the agenda.

Stan Kailis
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