Olive oil prices expected to rise after Spain’s poor harvest

The country responsible for half the world’s olive oil production suffered one of the worst harvests in decades due to drought and unprecedented heat waves this summer, according to reports.

Officials in the southern region of Andalusia, which accounts for 80% of Spain’s production, will produce almost 48% less oil that the average over the past five years. This shortage could result in price increases of up to 25%, reports The Times of London.

Carmen Crespo, the regional government’s agricultural minister, laid the blame on the crisis on “climate change and the persistent drought that we have suffered repeatedly in recent years.”

Europe is suffering through its worst drought in 500 years, according to the European Drought Observatory. The New York Times reported last month that the area is experiencing heat waves so severe that the city of Seville named them Zoe – the way tropical storms and hurricanes are named in the U.S.

One expert told The Times that the global olive oil market may see a shortage of around 500,000 tons this year.

The olive trees that have sustained thousands of farmers in Spain since the Romans first planted them centuries ago are wilting under the historically harsh summer.

Augustin Bautista, a 42-year-old farmer with a wife and two children, expects his grove to produce only a fifth of the 13,000 gallons of olive oil it typically makes.

“I’m going to lose money,” Bautista told the New York Times in a resigned tone of voice. “No water, no future.”

The local government of Jaén, where he lives, expects the province’s farmers will lose $1 million in income this year.

Jaén officials have nurtured a small, budding tourism industry around their cash crop, including spas with olive oil treatments and specialty shops that sell dozens of local varieties. Visitors can also spend a day working and living as an olive farmer for 27 euros ($27, meals included).

Locals understand that tourism cannot offset this year’s catastrophic losses but still see hope in outsiders’ interest in their lifestyle. One local mill owner told the New York Times that he has had 50,000 visitors from 78 countries.