`Award-Winning Greek Producer Looks East - Olive Oil Times
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Award-Winning Greek Producer Looks East

By Costas Vasilopoulos
Jan. 30, 2023 14:44 UTC

From the fer­tile olive groves of the Peloponnese penin­sula in south­ern Greece, the extra vir­gin olive oils of Olix Oil travel to dis­tant des­ti­na­tions on four con­ti­nents.

Since its incep­tion in 2011, the export-ori­ented com­pany has always pri­or­i­tized qual­ity.

“We pro­duce, bot­tle and mar­ket extra vir­gin olive oil of pre­mium qual­ity apply­ing state-of-the-art tech­nolo­gies in all pro­duc­tion stages,” Prodromos Saliagkas, the com­mer­cial direc­tor of Olix Oil, told Olive Oil Times. ​“Our vision is to be able to ful­fill the needs of our cus­tomers any­where in the world and famil­iar­ize them with Greek fla­vors.”

Brightened by no less than three Gold Awards at the NYIOOC 2022 World Olive Oil Competition, the world’s largest olive oil qual­ity con­test, Olix Oil’s quest for qual­ity is designed to sat­isfy the palates of its cus­tomers in some of the most demand­ing mar­kets in the world.

See Also:Olix Oil Official Guide

Despite its rel­a­tively short exis­tence in the indus­try, the pro­ducer quickly expanded its cus­tomer base to numer­ous mar­kets world­wide, includ­ing the Balkans, the U.S. and Canada, and some African coun­tries.

However, the jewel in the company’s export port­fo­lio is Japan, where Olix Oil has set the pace for other Greek olive oil exporters oper­at­ing in the Land of the Rising Sun. According to Saliagkas, the East Asian nation is an ever-grow­ing mar­ket for olive oil with great poten­tial and an uncom­pro­mised desire for qual­ity.

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Prodromos Saliagkas

“We have been the largest exporter of Greek olive oil to Japan for the last seven years,” he said.

“The Japanese exhibit a high appre­ci­a­tion for qual­ity, maybe more than all oth­ers,” Saliagkas added. ​“We are also aware that Japan is a highly demand­ing mar­ket with many dis­tinct char­ac­ter­is­tics, so we always ensure that our olive oil is of the best qual­ity and has all the nec­es­sary spec­i­fi­ca­tions.”

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Harvest at Olix Oil

“A large swath of Japanese con­sumers have started to use olive oil as a healthy cook­ing ingre­di­ent more fre­quently since the trend toward healthy eat­ing and organic food prod­ucts started to grow in the coun­try,” he also said.

Recent mar­ket research by the Greek Embassy in Tokyo has found that Japan ranks first among other Asian nations in the per capita con­sump­tion of olive oil. They use approx­i­mately half a kilo a year.

According to the research, the ris­ing demand for olive oil in Japan is partly linked to the coun­try’s increas­ing pop­u­lar­ity of the Mediterranean diet.

Data from the Olive Council shows that Japan imported more than 60,000 tons of olive oil and olive pomace oil in 2020/21, with Spain and Italy account­ing for most of the imports.

Furthermore, the Japanese prize sev­eral char­ac­ter­is­tics regard­ing food prod­ucts, includ­ing new fla­vors, inno­v­a­tive pack­ag­ing, price and health ben­e­fits. They also notice the coun­try of ori­gin, the embassy’s report reported. This fea­ture can dif­fer­en­ti­ate a prod­uct in the vast Japanese mar­ket of 125 mil­lion poten­tial con­sumers.

The devo­tion to qual­ity paid off for Olix Oil at the NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition last year.

See Also:Greek Producers Enjoy Another Triumphant Showing in World Competition

Their Naté Premium, Koroneiki Premium, and Ladelia Premium brands earned the high­est dis­tinc­tion at the indus­try’s most pres­ti­gious com­pe­ti­tion.

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“The awards at NYIOOC have been such an impor­tant dis­tinc­tion and the best moti­va­tion to fur­ther develop and improve our com­pany,” Saliagkas said. ​“They fill us with energy to con­tinue offer­ing the goods of the Greek land.”

Saliagkas said Olix Oil tar­gets qual­ity through inno­v­a­tive tech­nol­ogy. Agritech, or agri­cul­tural tech­nol­ogy, is a cru­cial con­cept at the com­pany. Agritech can be sum­ma­rized as apply­ing tech­nol­ogy to make farm­ing processes more effi­cient and allow farm­ers to pro­duce more with less.

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Agritech appli­ca­tions can pro­vide help­ful real-time infor­ma­tion to farm­ers, such as soil mois­ture con­tent, air tem­per­a­ture and other weather con­di­tions and the pres­ence of pests. Irrigated crops can also ben­e­fit from agritech: The tech­nol­ogy ensures they receive the right amount of water for an opti­mum bal­ance between crop growth and water­ing.

“Among oth­ers, we have installed smart irri­ga­tion sys­tems in our groves to con­stantly mon­i­tor and value the water sup­plies since the needs in water con­stantly change through­out the year,” he told us.

“We also use spe­cial­ized equip­ment to avoid hurt­ing the trees and the olive fruits dur­ing the har­vest,” he con­tin­ued. ​“It’s all about respect­ing the trees and the envi­ron­ment.”

Since start­ing olive oil pro­duc­tion more than a decade ago, Olix Oil has evolved into a multi-prod­uct pro­ducer. They offer a wide range of olive-based prod­ucts, includ­ing extra vir­gin and all other grades of olive oil, table olives and olive paste. The company’s prod­uct range also includes wine, vine­gar, honey and pome­gran­ate juice.

The cap­stone of Olix Oil’s line of EVOOs is the Naté Premium, an early-har­vested, high-phe­no­lic olive oil from hand-picked Koroneiki olives. It con­veys the company’s rul­ing pas­sion for healthy prod­ucts with high stan­dards.

“The unripe olive fruits is the rea­son for the oil’s low acid­ity and high load of antiox­i­dants and polyphe­nols,” the com­pany said, describ­ing its oil. ​“The high nutri­tional value of our olive oil boosts our immune sys­tem and helps us func­tion bet­ter. This first-rate olive oil from Koroneiki has a soft tex­ture and a slightly spicy taste that’s a bit on the bit­ter side.”

Olix Oil also enjoys bol­ster­ing its firm foot­ing in the indus­try through col­lab­o­ra­tions. The com­pany has joined forces with the Vatopedi Monastery, one of the largest con­vents on Mount Athos, where the cul­ti­va­tion of olive trees dates back cen­turies.

“Our coop­er­a­tion with the Vatopedi monastery has enabled us to sup­ply our cus­tomers with the monastery’s exquis­ite prod­ucts com­ing directly from the unique ecosys­tem of mount Athos,” Saliagkas said. ​“They form a range of prod­ucts of supe­rior qual­ity, includ­ing extra vir­gin olive oil, wine and honey, all of organic pro­duc­tion.”

Olix Oil is not con­tent with sup­ply­ing cus­tomers world­wide with its qual­ity EVOOs. The brand’s next step is to pro­mote the envi­ron­men­tally-con­scious pro­duc­tion of olive oil.

Saliagkas pointed out that the company’s mis­sion is to be part of the respon­si­ble growth of the olive oil sec­tor by respect­ing the envi­ron­ment.

“We also want to strengthen the envi­ron­men­tal influ­ence of olive oil pro­duc­tion,” he added. ​“This is achieved by always main­tain­ing envi­ron­men­tal aware­ness and by care­fully select­ing our part­ners and col­lab­o­ra­tors to con­tribute to our cause.”

Saliagkas believes that Greece can build a solid foun­da­tion for its agri­cul­tural sec­tor for gen­er­a­tions. He is also con­fi­dent that the future of agri­cul­ture lies in tech­nol­ogy and pre-har­vest con­trac­tual agree­ments.

“We have always believed that the future of our coun­try is its blessed soil,” he said. ​“For this rea­son, we always strive with our part­ners to help our farm­ers achieve a bet­ter end prod­uct.”

“In addi­tion, we believe that agritech and con­tract farming is the way to rein­force agri­cul­tural pro­duc­tion and estab­lish the right con­di­tions to pro­duce and mar­ket qual­ity food prod­ucts.”

“Ultimately, we want our cus­tomers to get acquainted with the Greek fla­vors, which are cel­e­brated every­where in the world, and ben­e­fit from the top diet, the Mediterranean,” he said in con­clu­sion.

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