Operational Group: Recovery and recycling of dried oil from olive mill ponds in olive grove soils. Agronomic and environmental benefits

The project is in line with various European initiatives, such as the European Biodiversity Strategy within the 2020 framework, which includes, as part of its Objective 3, the increase in the role of agriculture in maintaining and improving biodiversity, promoting, through the CAP, the application of sustainability measures in crops, and, among others, improving the organic matter content of soils as an indicator of improved soil quality. Another environmental concern in the agrosystem is the contamination of ecosystems due to the inappropriate and excessive use of agricultural inputs, a concern reflected in the "Farm to Fork" Strategy (COM/2020/381).

This project will demonstrate the allelopathic effect of applying organic agricultural amendments on weeds and the nutrient recycling that their incorporation into the soil entails, enabling the optimized use of herbicides and fertilizers. Furthermore, the project proposes the creation of an agricultural model that achieves net carbon sequestration in the soil through the application of organic amendments. This will not only mitigate emissions generated in the crop area, but may also lead to a farm achieving net negative emissions.

This characteristic allows us to move from a CO2-emitting model to one that acts as a climate change mitigator. In this sense, government initiatives following the Paris Agreement are moving toward reducing emissions in diverse sectors, such as agriculture, which, moreover, holds great potential, not only in terms of reducing emissions but also as a potential mitigator of carbon in the atmosphere.