Fats and oils 8 kg
The overall positive carbon footprint of one litre of olive oil. International Olive Council
multinational Deoleo explaining that thick ground cover can hide a plethora of flowers and plants. Altogether Vilchez adds, every litre of olive oil Deoleo produces results in two kilos of carbon dioxide – but the olive groves themselves eliminate about ten kilos from the atmosphere. “That results,” he stresses, “in a positive carbon footprint of eight.”
A whole lotta grove
Notwithstanding the innate environmental benefits of olive oil production, insiders are working hard to bolster their sustainability credentials in other ways. One notable example, says Lopez, involves waste water. “With the transition in the 2000s to a different olive oil mill extraction system that uses almost no water,” she explains, “the consumption of water during olive oil production decreased enormously – more than 90% – and the quality of the oil increased: namely in polyphenols concentration.” It helps, says Vilchez, that producers can now reuse waste water in a prime example of the circular economy. From there, technology can cut water use in other ways, with drones helping farmers understand exactly how much H2
O they need – before efficient
watering systems, powered by the latest software, target water to exactly where it’s needed. In a broader sense, moreover, it’s clear that the globalised nature of olive oil production requires work up and down the supply chain. As Palomino puts it: “From the farmer to the consumer, to the industrialist, the packer, the supplier, the distributor and the catering sector, each one makes decisions that can improve sustainability throughout the life cycle of the product.” That’s clearly borne out in practice. At Deoleo, for instance, sustainability leader José María Zamora describes working with partners to make packaging
“From the farmer to the consumer, to the industrialist, the packer, the supplier, the distributor and the catering sector, each one makes decisions that can improve sustainability throughout the life cycle of the product.”
Juan Antonio Polo Palomino
more recyclable – the company is already moving towards rPET plastic, while the vast majority of the Madrid firm’s factories are waste free. Across the Atlantic, Pompeian is moving in a similar direction. As Paula Lopes, the company’s vice president of quality, R&D explains, that involves reducing the weight of packaging and incorporating recycled materials into products. Through it all is a commitment to the latest environmental codes: Pompeian has adopted the so-called SFI cardboard certification, designed to
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protect forests, while Deoleo boasts Intertek Sustainability validation across a range of supplies. As these varied efforts imply, meanwhile, success would be impossible without the support of external stakeholders. That unsurprisingly begins at the very start of the oil production process, with Vilchez explaining how Deoleo encourages farmers to protect the lively ground cover of their olive groves. Completing some 30 training sessions with agricultural partners, he says it’s vital not to “impose” solutions on unwilling participants. Pompeian, for its part, encourages comparable thoughtfulness. “We have been exploring a collaboration with Pollinator Partnership to implement a certification programme,” Lopez says, “knowing an important resource in the development of sustainable olive groves includes the development of a robust pollinator community – bees, birds, insects – on all farms.” Just as strikingly, Lopez adds that she’s keen on sharing the roadmap with competitors across the sector.
Oil be back
These campaigns are obviously good for the planet. Bolstered by those impressive carbon figures, what Palomino calls the “manmade forest” of olive groves, consumers are “fighting against climate change” through every bottle of oil they buy. Yet as this statement implies, increased sustainability doesn’t merely provide succour to a warming world – but also pleases a public increasingly conscious of their green responsibilities. According to recent work by IPSOS, to give one example, some 58% of European consumers consider the climate when purchasing food. As Deoleo’s Zamora puts it: “They want us as companies to be more sustainable because they make them feel better.” To put it differently, the move towards sustainability
doesn’t have to be a zero-sum game – and can instead bolster sales while simultaneously limiting global temperature rises. Not that the situation is quite that simple. For one thing, Zamora notes that while consumers are keen to buy green, they’re not always comfortable with the higher retail prices environmentalism can bring. There are broader challenges too. While Pompeian and Deoleo are just two of the sector giants pressing ahead with voluntary green certification, fully-fledged regulations have arguably been slower to emerge. Yet here too, things are changing fast. “Recently,” Palomino explains, “several initiatives have emerged to generate ‘carbon credits’ from agriculture which could hypothetically be monetised on the voluntary emissions market. The EU is at present working on a framework for certifying carbon removals.” With the US Environmental Protection Agency exploring new pollutant rules of their own, agriculture will obviously have plenty to keep busy with – but based on past form, the olive oil sector doesn’t have much to worry about.
Ingredients Insight /
www.ingredients-insight.com
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