Bella Olea: organic, successful and in demand

It’s been suggested that you can’t successfully grow olives organically in New Zealand’s colder and higher rainfall climate. That’s being proven wrong by Chris and Hilary Penman, whose Bella Olea grove is thriving under organic management and producing award-winning EVOO. If it’s a path you’ve considered following, their story is sure to provide practical inspiration.

Not everyone would call caring for 800 olive trees a hobby but for Chris and Hilary Penman, full-time jobs in broadcasting and government business mean that for them it is - albeit, they say, an “all-consuming” one.

On the outskirts of Greytown in the Wairarapa food and wine region, the Penman’s Bella Olea grove is one of just a few in New Zealand managed organically. And after 10 years of hard, chemicalfree work, they’re now just months from achieving full organic certification.

They’re also multi-medal winners at both the Olives NZ EVOO Awards and NZ Royal Easter Show, and have increasing demand for their range of organic products - olive oil, table olives, olive leaf extract, and hand and body lotions.

Background

The Penmans bought the grove from a beef farmer, who in around 2000 had planted 3.5 hectares of his property with olives. Their own life practices and beliefs made moving the grove to organic production a given.

“We’d always been into healthy living and spray-free or organic food consumption,” Chris said.

“This naturally translated into growing olives organically, and to learning about soil and tree health.

“It hasn’t always been easy but having consumer and wholesale markets here that value organic olive oil has created a good demand, which we are now expanding to meet. Commercially, we are improving our management of the grove to increase yields and our adoption of a new bio-fungicide is showing promise.”

Management practices

The major difference at Bella Olea is, of course, that they don’t use ‘standard’ horticultural chemicals.

“We use only approved organic products,” Chris said.

“The bio-fungicide we use has enzymes that eat fungal spores and we are experimenting with spray rates etc. Stepping up the pruning regime and making sure the trees get the fertiliser/nutrition they need is showing good results.

“The regular pruning was something we’ve learned about through experience. We were always behind while trying to do it all ourselves, so with the help of contractors we are now getting on top of it. Thinking of going organic?

Bella Olea’s transformation to a more healthy and increasingly productive grove is proof that organic production can be successfully and viably achieved. Given their experiences, we asked Chris what advice he’d share with other growers thinking of moving to organic olive growing. “Speak to your customers and find out what they want,” he said. “There is a definite upswing in interest in locally produced (regional/NZ) organic olive oil, from local farmers market through to wholesale/retail sectors. And through organic certification consumers can be confident they are getting a healthy product produced sustainably. “Also spare a thought for the planet. Keep reading and researching on ways to grow healthy trees without dumping tonnes of chemicals onto your properties. “And to those who say it can’t be done with olives: watch this space! It’s certainly working for us.”

“The smaller prunings are mulched around the trees, for moisture retention and to add organic matter to the soil, and the larger branches we give away to friends for firewood.

“We also have an interest in biodynamics, and will start adding biodynamic sprays and practices into our management plan soon.” Organic value

Chris admits that growing organically - and particularly gaining organic certification –has meant jumping more hurdles than with ‘regular’ grove management, but that they’re confident the extra effort is worth it.

“From the start (10-plus years ago) we have followed organic practices and a few years ago we decided to go down the certification route. That, along with the recent government’s Food Safety Regulations, has meant quite a bit of paperwork,” he said.

“Organic certification is through Organic Farms NZ and requires annual audits of grove management. The good news is that our grove is due for its final audit and will gain Certified Organic status in a few months’ time.

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“We would always have been organic, whether certified or not, but it’s great to have certification that shows the market that we are serious about healthy soil and healthy trees. We have major customers who are on board with us now specifically because of our organic status.”

And their organic status is providing its own commercial benefits, they’ve found.

“We now manage a few other groves organically to help meet the growing demand for organic oil,” Chris said.

“We can leverage off our management practices and equipment - for example, our sprayer is dedicated for organic-only use - to get an economy of scale that helps the business.

“And we’ve proven that managing an olive grove organically can be successful: the recent harvest on our grove was one of our biggest ever, producing 9000kg from 700 trees harvested. That crop yield was from heavily pruned trees, so we know that even greater yields are possible after re-growth.”

Focus Grove Project participation Bella Olea has also joined the second phase of the Olives NZ Focus Grove Project, utilising a new - still organic, of course - regime which includes recommendations from the FGP learnings and project consultant Stuart Tustin. The March field day report noted that the regime is obviously working well, with vast improvements in grove health since the October visit. Major areas of management focus are: Nutrition - to improve the overall condition of the grove and for productivity, using liquid saweed and organic fertiliser, supplemented with boron and magnesium. Disease management – spraying with liquid seaweed fungicide every 6-8 weeks. This is proving effective, with Anthracnose minimal this year. They also run sheep for grove floor management, cleaning out suckers, and eating fallen and diseased leaves.

Pruning is ongoing to reduce tree size and density, with good extension growth now evident as a result of this and the improved disease control.