Probably no later than next week, there will be a collapse in the sector, because olive picking and olive oil production will have to stop since there is no room to put the olive pomace produced by the mills in the Alentejo, said Aníbal Martins, member of the board of directors of CONFAGRI - the National Confederation of Agricultural Cooperatives and Agricultural Credit of Portugal.

According to the director, the three units in the Alentejo that process olive pomace from the region's mills have practically exhausted their storage capacity for that by-product resulting from oil production.

Due to the increase in olive production and the climatic conditions (lack of rain) favourable to the rapid harvesting of olives, olives have arrived in larger quantities and more quickly at the mills and an unusual volume of olive pomace to be processed in the three units, he explained.

Aníbal Martins, who is also president of FENAZEITES - Federação Nacional das Cooperativas Agrícolas de Olivicultores and manager of the União de Cooperativas Agrícolas do Sul (UCASUL), the owner of the Alvito unit, warned that if the sector stops, it could cause incalculable damage to farmers and companies linked to the sector.

On the other hand, he said that there could be real environmental chaos in the absence of a place to produce olive pomace, which could reach 600,000 tonnes in the current olive-growing campaign.

According to Aníbal Martins, the UCASUL unit receives 5,000 tonnes of olive pomace, but only can transform 1,000 tonnes per day, that is, it accumulates four tonnes every day and cannot currently store more.

Aníbal Martins said that the cooperative olive sector, through CONFAGRI, FENAZEITES and UCASUL, has been raising awareness of the responsible entities, including the Ministry of Agriculture, for the problem and the possibility of the serious situation of the collapse of the olive sector in Alentejo.

CONFAGRI and FENAZEITES will soon meet with the Minister of Agriculture to analyse the problem and seek a solution, he said, noting that the meeting is agreed, but not yet scheduled.

Aníbal Martins said that a new bagasse processing unit is needed or to expand the capacity of the three existing units in the Alentejo to solve the problem.

The municipal master plans (PDM) only allow the installation of this type of units near urban agglomerations, but here the problem, which is in the process of being solved, is that the units have a bad image from the environmental point of view, because, although all are working within the law, the visual aspect is very negative.