Oulibo
Olive Co-operative Bize-Minervois to triple production|
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| Oulibo Olive Co-operative Bize-Minervois to triple production | ||
| In
1942 12 Aude olive growers formed the co-operative Oulibo to process
and sell their Lucque olives. 62 years later the Oulibo co-op employs
27 full time staff, 40 temporary staff in season and has 1,700 members
accross the Languedoc, the majority in the Aude but also in the Pyrenees
and in the Herault. The Oulibo co-op specialises in the production
of the lucque olive, unique to the Labguedoc region. The annual production
stands at 450 metric tons of table olives and 450 metric tons of olives
for oil. Between 2002 and 2004 the quantity of olives processed grew
by 270 tons per year. Pierre-Andre Marty, director since 1981 of the
Olibo Olive Co-op, estimates that in 2-3 years time they will reach
700-800 tons of table olives and 1,000 tons of olives for oil. Oulibo
is now the largest olive processing plant in France. The Oulibo co-op is now an established part of the Aude tourist route, the shop recieves 150,000 visitors per year. The Oulibo olives and oil are sold in most supermarkets and local produce shops throughout the region, 10% of its production is exported, a figure which is growing 20% a year at the moment. With an annual turn over of 4,000,000 euro Oulibo is one of the Aude's fastest growing businesses. Mr Marty has drawn up plans to increase the building by 2500 square metres (25,000 square feet) to enlarge the shop, instal a second olive mill, start producing bio-olives( organic olives), start an e-commerce site to sell the olives direct via the internet, and expand the tourism side of the business. The history of olives in the Aude is a mixed one, pre-1956 the Aude was a large scale producer of olives but the hard winter frosts of that year killed the majority of the trees. Most of the dead olive groves were replaced by vines, an altogether more hardy crop. The changing agricultural subsidies is now putting economic pressure on farmers to pull up their poorer quality vines- and olives are becoming the natural replacement. |
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