Georgia Hosts Annual Olive Council Meetings for First Time

Two years after its ascen­sion to the International Olive Council (IOC), Georgia will host two of the inter­gov­ern­men­tal organization’s main annual events.

On November 24, the 57^th meet­ing of the Advisory Committee will take place in Tbilisi, the country’s cap­i­tal city, fol­lowed by the 114^th ses­sion of the IOC Council the next day.

Already, var­i­ous IOC com­mit­tees are meet­ing the Executive Secretariat by video­con­fer­ence. The com­mit­tees are in charge of ana­lyz­ing and explor­ing issues related to admin­is­tra­tive and finan­cial affairs, eco­nom­ics and pro­mo­tion, the olive oil obser­va­tory, stan­dard­iza­tion and research and tech­nol­ogy and envi­ron­ment.

On November 26, which also marks the two-year anniver­sary of the inau­gu­ra­tion of World Olive Day, IOC offi­cials will join their Georgian coun­ter­parts in the pres­i­den­tial palace to hear from a range of dif­fer­ent speak­ers.

Among them will be Gabriel Vigil, who over­sees the olive oil sec­tor at the European Commission; Joseph R. Profaci, the exec­u­tive direc­tor of the North American Olive Oil Association and Juan Vilar, a strate­gic con­sul­tant for the olive sec­tor.

IOC offi­cials and Georgian del­e­gates also will visit local olive groves in Kakheti, the east­ern­most region of the coun­try with a long his­tory of wine pro­duc­tion, to see the progress that has been made by farm­ers since Georgia joined the IOC in 2019.

According to data from Juan Vilar Strategic Consultants, Georgia pro­duces about 900 tons of olive oil each year and 500 tons of table olives, almost all of which is con­sumed domes­ti­cally.

Georgia boasts about 2,500 hectares of olive groves, most of which are located in the south­west of the coun­try. Of these, 60 per­cent are planted at high-den­sity and 40 per­cent at super-high-den­sity.

During the 112^th ses­sion of the IOC Council in November 2020, Georgia announced plans to grow 40 new hectares of olive groves with tech­ni­cal help from the IOC to ​“sig­nif­i­cantly boost olive pro­duc­tion.”

“Georgia enjoys being a fam­ily mem­ber of the IOC since 2019 and has embraced the oppor­tu­nity as an unprece­dented alter­na­tive for devel­op­ing the olive sec­tor,” Georgian Minister of Environment Protection and Agriculture Levan Davitashvili told the ses­sion.

Daniel Dawson con­tributed to this report.

• Georgian Ministry of Environment Protection and Agriculture
• International Olive Council