The planet's main producer of olive oil has begun stockpiling supplies in a bid to avoid future shortages and wild price fluctuations of the beloved cooking ingredient.
Spain has told its producers to begin holding back 12 percent of their olive oil, either in their own facilities or in third-party silos.
The move, which the country's Directorate-General for Agricultural Production and Markets announced on Friday via the country's Official State Gazette, calls for the stockpiling to begin immediately.
Olive oil hoarded through the initiative must be kept off the market until Sept 30, said the directorate-general, which is part of Spain's Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food.
"The aim is to regulate supply in order to improve and stabilize the functioning of the market and the sector," the ministry said in a statement.
Euronews reported Spain is expecting a bumper olive harvest this year, after the whole of Europe endured years of poor harvests.
The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food has said its stock of olive oil had dropped to just 357,040 metric tons earlier this year but the current harvest is expected to produce 1.6 million metric tons. The ministry said the bumper harvest, which it predicts will be 23 percent larger than last year's harvest, would likely drive down the price of olive oil if it had not ordered producers to hold back the 12 percent, which it expects to come to around 188,000 metric tons.
The El Pais newspaper said Spanish olive oil producers had already started to notice the impact of the looming bumper harvest, with extra virgin olive oil selling for around 3 euros ($3.34) a kilo this month after having been 4 euros earlier this year.
Spain claims to produce around 45 percent of the world's olive oil, some 70 percent of the European Union's total.
Recent droughts and heat waves attributed to global warming have caused widespread problems for olive oil producers in recent years but conditions this year were much better, with mild temperatures and abundant rain during the spring leading the ministry to predict the harvest this year will be the fourth-best on record.
Southern Spain's Diario Sur newspaper said the government has the power to order olive oil producers to stockpile supplies under powers introduced in 2021 that have remained unused until today. The powers kick in if a year's total production is expected to be 20 percent or more in excess of the average from the previous six years.
El Pais said the Coordinating Committee of Farmers' and Livestock Breeders' Organizations welcomed the move.
Francisco Elvira, the group's spokesperson for olive farmers, said: "It will prevent extreme situations, such as seeing olive oil priced (too high) in the supermarket or olive growers having to sell below cost."
