Читать книгу Oil and Oilseed Processing - Ingrid Aguilo-Aguayo - Страница 20

The olive tree (Olea europea L.) is one of the oldest known cultivated trees in the world and olive oil has become one of the most widely accepted and used oils in culinary applications. The amount of food products manufactured using olive oil increases every year. Some of these are listed in Table 1.1. Olive oil is a staple food for people living in Mediterranean countries but its use is now expanding to other parts of the world. As can be seen in Figure 1.1, the olive tree is currently being cultivated in several countries including Spain, Italy, Greece, Tunisia, Portugal, Turkey, Morocco, Argentina, Australia, and the US, among others. The world production of olives was approximately 20.87 Mt in 2017. Approximately 62% of the total world production of olives was carried out in Europe, with Spain, Greece, and Italy the biggest producers with 6.54, 2.72, and 2.57 Mt/year in 2017, respectively. The EU is the leading producer, consumer, and exporter of olive oil: indeed, in the last five marketing years the EU produced, consumed, and exported 67, 55, and 67% of the worlds' olive oil. The biggest non‐European producers were Morocco and Egypt with an annual production of 1.03 and 0.92 Mt in 2017 (UN 2019). Major exporters of olive fruit in 2016 were Portugal, Spain, Mexico, Greece, and Jordan: 24.69, 12.81, 10.72, 4.47, and 3.39 kt, respectively. Portugal was also the most important importer of olives, with approximately 19.25 kt imported during 2016, most of these from Spain (EU 2019). Spain is the biggest producer of olive oil followed by Italy and Greece with a production of 1.73, 0.29, and 0.21 Mt of virgin olive oil during 2014, respectively. These countries were also the most important exporters with approximately 920.82, 354.29, and 161.00 kt exported during 2016. Major non‐European olive oil producers are Tunisia and Morocco, followed by Syria with an annual production of approximately 179.70, 137.40, and 100.64 kt, respectively. Tunisia ranks fifth just behind Portugal among the major olive oil exporters with 107.95 and 117.83 kt of oil exported in 2016. During 2018/2019, from the total 124.06 kt of olive oil exported from the EU to non‐EU countries, 41.80, 12.80, 9.66, and 5.74 kt were imported by the US, China, Japan, and Canada, respectively (Ferraris 2019). These values show a 22.6, 0.5, 18.4, and 34.4% increase when compared to the period 2017/2018.