Town marks first olive oil harvest of season

8 December 2003

JAEN – A town marked the first olive oil season of the year by handing out 6,000 traditional sandwiches, it was reported Monday.

The ‘hoyos’ are made with bread, olive oil, olives and codfish.

Officials in the town of Martos, near Jaen, in Andalusia, handed them out to mark the first olive oil harvest of the season.

The town is known as one of the biggest producers of the olive oil in this part of Spain.

The commemoration also included a symbolic event in which two expert oil millers pressed the first olive oil of the 2003-4 season with a specially mounted oil press.

Previously, town officials laid a wreath at the base of the olive harvesters’ monument.

The harvest forecast for this year is 643,832 tonnes of oil. This forecast is greater than Italy’s, which is the second-largest producer after Spain.

Almost 100 percent of the 327 oil mills in the province of Jaén are already in full production.

This year’s harvest will involve an estimated 50,000 workers.

[Copyright EFE with Expatica]

Subject: Spanish news