Yield or productivity: what is useful to pay attention to
Every year, during the olive harvest, in the mills we always ask ourselves what the yield in oil can be. But exactly what is surrender? It is a productivity index, a percentage value that specifies how many liters of oil have been produced from 100kg of olives.
This percentage value contains the many hopes of olive growers: a good yield will pay off a year of hard work and costs incurred for the care of the olive trees.
What does the yield depend on?
The yield is strictly correlated with the oil extraction process and basically depends on the quality of the olives, the climatic conditions throughout the year and the ripening, and the peculiar characteristics of the mill where the processing takes place.
Consequently, if the farmer can try to intervene in several stages on productivity; on yield the only moment of intervention can be the pressing.
The olive tree is a millennial plant and lives in a very strong fusion with the territory, from which it learns a sort of "genetic code" of reference. At the slightest change in the microclimate, or its habitat, the properties of the oil also vary, with different qualities from one year to the next.
For this reason, rain, wind, sun, altitude, climatic temperature and soil characteristics play a decisive role in the yield of olive oil. Therefore favorable climatic conditions, combined with careful and rational agronomic techniques, are the ideal conditions for obtaining a very high quality extra virgin olive oil.
The right conditions for a better yield
Furthermore, the period and methods of collection significantly affect the final product. In fact, there is no single harvest period for all olives, but it varies according to the type of olive (September / November for the early, December / January for the late) and climatic conditions.
Particular attention should also be given to the veraison, or the coloring process, of the olives which must be from green to purple to obtain a quality oil, rich in polyphenols and with a decidedly fruity taste.
On the other hand, the core fragments could be an obstacle to an excellent yield: specifically the pasta must be fluid. The presence of these hazel fractions becomes fundamental since they favor "beaching", that is, the separation in centrifugation of the liquid from the solid part which, through these small particles, drains as it does the water on the sand on the beach.
Obviously, no effects were taken into consideration, positive on yield but negative on quality, such as longer storage times for olives, with consequent loss of humidity and increased yield. We at Oleificio Lovascio are always careful to obtain the maximum yield from our olives to offer a superior quality product on your tables.