Savantes into the Future
Welcome 2021 - Good-bye 2020
What a year that was, testing resilience throughout the world with restrictions imposed on every facet of our lives.
We hope you, your families and businesses have been relatively unaffected and are in good health.
We have been affected by the impact of lockdown in Australia with borders closed to international travel. The projected Savantes events have been stopped indefinitely, as we observe have many activities of our Savantes, Associates and participants. As the pandemic ebbs we wish you all success in returning your enterprises to pre-pandemic levels and the olive oil industry returning to some semblance of order.
No doubt the time of reflection imposed on you over the past 9 months has resulted in some changes in the way you will conduct business in the post-Covid era. At Savantes we have resolved to resume our overseas activities as soon Australia allows international travel which we expect will be around September 2021 when vaccination is widespread. We will concentrate our effort on Team Tasting Championships and are in discussions to hold an Iberian Championship in Portugal in late 2021 or early 2022, followed by the Second World Championship soon afterwards.
Our Sales Narrative Must be Built from the Consumer’s Perspective – Value for Money
Clearing out some dusty books I came across a 2011 publication sponsored by the European Union and Spain entitled ‘The surprisingly, marvellous, savoury, curious, healthy, historic, artistic and fantastic world of Olive Oil’. It is a beautiful informative book. The first significant pictorial of food comes on the 27th page. The preceding pages are full of production data, varietals, mythology, olive oil classifications and pictures of the olive groves of Spain stretching to the horizon.
The question is; does it sell olive oil to the consumer or is it a little self-indulgent, trying to satisfy those who paid for it first, the publisher, the producer organisations, the politicians and secondly persuade, incidentally, consumers? Is it trying to portray each of the facets described in the title? I am sure it has made money for the graphic artists, the designers, the authors and the administrators – I question the return to producers? My observation is that in the last 10 years since the publication of this book our narrative has not changed.
We hear endlessly of the Mediterranean diet pyramid in the context of olive oil sales. Analysis of Google Trends in the USA shows that a slight upward trend in searches on the Diet does not seem to lead to increased searches for olive oil.
Are Laboratories the Replacing the Palate?
There are many reasons given for the current oversupply of olive oil around the world – tariffs, trade agreements, loss of consumer confidence and the ubiquitous absence of educated consumers. Most of these are out of the control of the producers.
Contributing to this oversupply is declining or stagnant consumption in the main consuming countries – Spain, Italy, Greece and the USA.
There is one consideration which we observe in tasting extra virgin olive oils in Savantes programmes which does not get much attention. That is the question of whether the drive for quality defined by chemical parameters is producing a robust and bitter style and flavour of extra virgin olive oil which consumers do not like.
Team from Navarre wins first World Extra Virgin Olive Oil Team Tasting Championship
The first World Champion Extra Virgin Olive Oil Tasting Team is Los Navarros from Spain. The team comprised Roberto Gracia Sagasti, Carlos Gracia Sagasti and Mario Gomara Alfaro – all producers and taste panellists. Second was the Greek LET team of Lykourgos Polychronopoulos, Efstathia Zontanou and Takis Dimitrakopoulos. Lykourgos also became the fifth Savante and the first from Greece. The Greek JNP team were third and tied for fourth were the Team de Nimes from France and Los Narizones from Spain.
The championship was held in Priego de Cordoba, Spain, in Association with the Association for Quality Control of the Oils of the Region of Priego de Cordoba ((ASCCAL).
Eight competitors achieved Associate Savantes for the first time. The new Associates are Roberto Gracia Sagasti, Carlos Gracia Sagasti, Mario Gomara Alfaro, Isabel Calvache Gisberti, Covadonga Perez Silva from Spain, Julie Carou and Helene Lasserre from France and John Angelis from Greece.