Rome Joins Olive Oil Tourism Network Città dell'Olio

The munic­i­pal­ity of Rome is join­ing the Italian net­work, Città dell’Olio, an asso­ci­a­tion that includes more than 400 olive-grow­ing munic­i­pal­i­ties in Italy.

According to offi­cials in the Italian cap­i­tal, the ini­tia­tive will pro­mote olive oil cul­ture and olive oil tourism to offer new oppor­tu­ni­ties to local pro­duc­ers, farm­houses and tourist venues.

“This should not come as a sur­prise since Rome, and olive oil are his­tor­i­cally con­nected by a voca­tion and a mil­len­nial-long his­tory,” Sabrina Alfonsi, Rome’s sec­re­tary of agri­cul­ture, envi­ron­ment and waste man­age­ment, told Olive Oil Times.

“Olive oil has been one of the pil­lars of the Roman econ­omy since the 7^th Century BCE,” she added.

The announce­ment comes on the heels of sev­eral ini­tia­tives from the recent nation-wide oleo­tourism law which offers olive grow­ers and farm­houses new oppor­tu­ni­ties to broaden the scope of their activ­i­ties.

Officials said join­ing Città dell’Olio is a step toward their new food pol­icy approach, which is par­tially based on the so-called Fusilli ini­tia­tive.

According to a state­ment, Fusilli aims to achieve an ​“inte­grated and safe holis­tic tran­si­tion toward healthy, sus­tain­able, secure, inclu­sive and cost-effi­cient food sys­tems” in line with the European Union’s Food 2030 pol­icy, which is focused on healthy and sus­tain­able diets and the sus­tain­abil­ity and effi­ciency of the food sys­tems.

“The con­nec­tion to these roots aims to enhance this fun­da­men­tal food of the Mediterranean diet as an engine of eco­nomic and tourist devel­op­ment of our munic­i­pal­ity,” Alfonsi said.

“Today, our city is exper­i­ment­ing with the pro­duc­tion and the com­mer­cial­iza­tion of local qual­ity extra vir­gin olive oil pro­duced both in our agri­cul­tural estate in [the nearby town of] Castel di Guido and in the 189 olive trees present in the arche­o­log­i­cal park of the Colosseum,” she added.

The extra vir­gin olive oil pro­duced in the Colosseum arche­o­log­i­cal area on Palatine Hill is now known as Palatino extra vir­gin olive oil. It is part of a project to recover and under­stand the com­plex rela­tion­ship devel­oped through the ages between human set­tle­ments and veg­e­ta­tion.

“When Ancient Rome’s expan­sion reached this area, the marshes around the hill were reclaimed, and the rich­est fam­i­lies began build­ing their vil­las and plant­ing their orchards on the top of it,” Gabriella Strano, the land­scape archi­tect of the Colosseum Archeological Park, told Olive Oil Times in a May 2021 inter­view.

Recently, the European Union rec­og­nized the Olio di Roma PGI, a new Protected Geographical Indication that includes all five provinces of the Lazio region, and an annual pro­duc­tion of about 10,500 tons.

There are also four pre-exist­ing extra vir­gin olive oil Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) areas in the region, which city offi­cials said will gain fur­ther vis­i­bil­ity due to the renewed con­nec­tion with the ancient Italian cap­i­tal.

When the PGI was debated in 2018, the National Olive Growers’ Consortium and its allies argued that it would devalue pro­duc­ers in the four PDO regions.

A PDO cer­ti­fi­ca­tion indi­cates that an extra vir­gin olive oil’s prop­er­ties are deter­mined by its geo­graph­i­cal loca­tion and nat­ural and human fac­tors.

A PGI cer­ti­fi­ca­tion, on the other hand, indi­cates that at least one part of the process takes place in the des­ig­nated area. As a result, the lat­ter tends to cover a broader swath of ter­ri­tory than the for­mer.

“The recog­ni­tion of the Olio di Roma PGI by the E.U. does not over­lap with ter­ri­to­ries, such as Tuscia and Sabina, which have always pro­duced excel­lent olive oil but rather pro­vides them if they wish, an umbrella, rep­re­sented by the Roma brand, which could offer them advan­tages, espe­cially for exports,” Alfonsi said.

North of Rome, in the north­west­ern quad­rant of Lazio, most pro­duc­ers are mem­bers of the Canino PDO con­sor­tium, which is known for the local Canino vari­ety grown in the land of the Torlonia fam­ily, an ancient Roman fam­ily.

Other than Canino, local PDO pro­duc­ers grow Leccino, Pendolino, Frantoio and Maurino olives.

Frantoio, Canino and Leccino are also the main cul­ti­vars of Tuscia PDO extra vir­gin olive oil pro­duc­tion in the north­east­ern quad­rant of Lazio.

To the east of the Italian cap­i­tal, Sabina PDO pro­duc­ers grow Carboncella, Leccino, Raja, Pendolino, Moraiolo, Frantoio, Olivastrone, Salviana and Olivago e Rosciola olives.

South of Rome, in the Colline Pontine PDO area, pro­duc­ers spe­cial­ize in the Itrana, Frantoio and Leccino vari­eties.

In a state­ment, Città dell’Olio cel­e­brated Rome’s deci­sion to join the asso­ci­a­tion as ​“his­toric” and said it would help ​“com­bat the aban­don­ment of olive groves and agri­cul­tural lands and pro­mote olive oil tourism and the local expe­ri­ences con­nected to extra vir­gin olive oil.”

“It will also encour­age social agri­cul­ture and the intro­duc­tion of good prac­tices, which are inno­v­a­tive and sus­tain­able,” they added.

“I do believe that the olive oil sec­tor might con­sti­tute a rel­e­vant devel­op­ment for our city,” Alfonsi con­cluded.

• Città dell’Olio