Public policies in Portugal to support olive groves 115 environmental practices, a high level of biodiversity, the preservation of natural resources, and the application of stringent animal welfare standards — Intervention C.3.1.1 ‘Productive Investment in the Agriculture-based Bioeconomy –Modernisation’: processing or marketing of agricultural products; support services related to agriculture. — Intervention C.4.1.1. “Insurance”contributes to risk and disaster management; — Intervention C.4.2 “Support for the Promotion of Quality Products” contributes to enhancing the value of products of distinctive quality and to promoting and publicising national agricultural products on the domestic and external markets, including olive oil; —Interventions C.4.3.1 ‘Establishment of producer groups and organisations’ and C.4.3.2 ‘Inter-professional organisations’ contribute to optimising production costs, improving access to agricultural service providers, promoting the organisation of production and fostering vertical cooperation; —Intervention C.5.1 “Operational groups for innovation” helps to promote cooperation for innovation within the R&D system; — Intervention D.2.3 ‘Integrated Management in Critical Areas – Preservation of the Barroso landscape mosaic’, which includes olive groves. CAPSP Interventions that may benefit traditional olive groves alone include: — Intervention C.1.2.2 “Natura Network Payment”, which includes support for traditional olive groves; in Type 3 restricted areas (the geographical area corresponding to the polygon resulting from the overlap of: Moura/ Barrancos, Moura/Mourão/Barrancos, Évora, Reguengos, Alvito/Cuba and Cuba), where, due to the proximity of the Alqueva reservoir, intensive irrigated olive cultivation would theoretically be possible, but where such a change in land use is not permitted; in these areas, a higher Natura payment is available for traditional olive groves; — Intervention C.1.1.2.2 ‘Permanent Crops and Traditional Landscapes’ helps to counteract the abandonment of systems of high biodiversity value or traditional landscapes, which include, amongst others, traditional olive goves. Assessment of the olive oil and olive sector In preparation for the current CAP implementation cycle, the CAP Strategic Plan (CAPSP/PEPAC) 2023–2027, a sectoral analysis was carried out, which states that the olive oil and table olive sector, through active management based on innovative and sustainable agricultural production, represents a key factor in maintaining agricultural activity throughout mainland Portugal, without marked regional variations, contributing to an increase in farmers’ incomes, despite the negative perception identified regarding the way modern olive groves are managed. In this sectoral analysis, needs and weaknesses were identified, such as: a shortage of labour in traditional olive groves, high production costs, difficulties in organising the sector into Producer Organisations (POs), limited Research and Development (R&D) into the improvement of native varieties, obstacles to the application of plant protection products (for example, against the serious threat posed by Xylella fastidiosa), difficulties in environmental management, a low level of generic promotion and consumer information, weak bargaining power with large retailers, and uncertainties and vulnerabilities regarding markets and trade policies. On the other hand, needs common to the vegetable sector as a whole were identified, such as water availability, the lack of insurance against climate change and risk management, as well as producer prices heavily dependent on the Spanish market. Quality schemes, healthy eating, the Mediterranean diet, voluntary labelling and short supply chains are areas identified as having the potential to contribute to the enhancement of traditional olive production, particularly when it benefits from PDO/PGI/TSG designations. However, consumer preference is currently evident only in a small segment of the market, as shown by the fact that this type of PDO/PGI/TSG olive oil accounts for just 2% of total production. —Intervention C.3.1.2. “Investment in the Agriculture-Based Bioeconomy to Improve Environmental Performance”
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