mfesharne

In all honesty I don't know anyone who manages to sell their olive oil in any significant amount but I do know I can buy a litre of the stuff at market for a few Euros & that my neighbours give me the stuff on a fairly regular basis........ & it's the same with wine. - Both of which incidentally are very good indeed.

The wildlife, especially the wild boar are an absolute menace to growers & not a week goes by that my (mostly elderly) neighbours don't ask me to drop a few for them........ but as much of a nuisance they are, I like to see them occasionally so I pretty much always decline.

mfesharne

If you do go ahead with your plan, I wish you the very best of luck & will be genuinely interested to hear how it works out for you.

ouriquejan

There is a huge co-operative in Santa Caterina da Fonte de Bispo, where everyone local takes their olives - and flippin' good it is too.

But that's the Algarve, east Algarve.

liveaboard

Would you do five hundred hours of work for 500 euros? unless you get a disease or drought, or other problem. then you get nada.

The land is usually far from towns where there might be work, shopping, schools, and healthcare. People with children need those things.
People without children leave the country to find work that pays a living wage.

Yes, you could have a mule; they also cost money though. And they require considerable skill to train and work with, which takes time to acquire.
There are input costs; tractor rental for plowing, energy for pumping water, and fertilizer.
I've been watching the farmers for a while now, and talking to them too. I'm interested in how things work.
It's not that it isn't the "good life", but that small scale farming in Portugal is starvation, below subsistence level. You can't grow your taxes, health insurance, or internet connection.
Grow food and eat it if you like doing that; it's just great as a hobby.

Mike

Tony,
My wife and I both work, gardens and pools, to earn money to pay the bills.
We are trying to develop our small holding to become more self sufficient but we have to be realistic. At best it is a lifestyle choice/hobby.
We keep pigs, turkeys, geese, ducks and chickens.
We grow mainly summer crops and stock up for winter.
What we have learnt:
The pigs are going. Simply it is just too expensive. National farmers cannot compete with cheap imports.
The birds are easy and do give us eggs, which we can use or sell. Once they stop laying we can eat them. Mongoose have devastated our flock a couple of times.
Our water costs are horrendous. Unless you have a well or very cheap agricultural water you will be on a hiding to nothing. Obviously this has an impact on what and how we grow.
Selling surplus? Not a pray. Most of my neighbours grow more than me and the local markets are awash with produce. Then there is the cost of doing it officially, from a simple licence to declaring your income and paying taxes and social security.
You underestimate the local farmers at your peril. The techniques they have developed over decades to cope with climate, soil, water, etc work well. If they can't make it work then sorry, but even with substantial investment, you won't either, especially as a foreigner.
Times are changing. Supermarkets are dominating everything just as they did in UK. Small growers either have no outlet or are priced out my massive farm estates.
We are all painting a bleak picture based on our experiences. Sad but true.
If you go ahead, have enough money to buy, set up, run with no income for 2 years and a contingency if it does not work.

mfesharne

Another issue we haven't looked at yet is the legal requirement to keep the land clean for fire risk reasons...... Even if you don't farm your land you need to either spray it or cut it & both are hard work & not inexpensive.

If you do go ahead with the idea, there are a number of little tricks to learn which will make life easier for you.

For example, I also keep ducks and have dug shallow trenches from the ponds to my fruit trees so that when I flush the ponds out the dirty pond water (aka duck shit soup) runs to the fruit trees which increases growth rate & fruit production dramatically. - It also gives the ducks great entertainment paddling in the mud & when they do that, they keep the trenches clear which saves me having to maintain them......... but said, if I looked at the economics, I doubt the ducks come even close to paying for themselves.

Mike

I used to marvel at the old boys tending their irrigation trenches. True works of art and not a pump in sight. Sadly replaced by automated irrigation which needs constant maintenance and replacement due to the hard water.

EMR

Odly enough around ys we have seen the return of commercial farming., Felds, ploughed watered ,fenced with crops such as brassicas and squash.
Their customers are local supermarkets and those who watch PT tv can see on their adds references to local growers..

MikeJ

Just over the border from Eastern Algarve in Huelva province in Spain is some of the most fertile land in southern Spain, given to growing soft fruit and oranges (the famous Seville oranges). I can't believe that there is a huge difference in the terroir between the two countries so there may be big opportunities in the Eastern Algarve?

liveaboard

A few years ago, I met a guy who has an orchard with 500 orange trees.
He once made a good living selling his fruit.
Now he lets it fall and rot; the cost of picking is higher than the sale value.
The truck driver gets paid, the distributor, the packers and the pickers, the kid who stacks it in the market, everyone gets paid before the farmer who grows it.

I pick my fruit, then give it away; if I can.

mfesharne

So many oranges & sharon fruit in my area you literally can't give 'em away.

I feed most of my sharon fruit to my ducks who love 'em & the rest is left for the wild boar or to rot.

We eat some but there's a limit to how much just 2 people can enjoy!

EMR

When we first visited the Algarve there were a handfull of roadside orange sellers.
Now they seem to be every km or so on the main road, price for 5kgd 2.5euro or less.
Many are unemployed or casual hoping to make a few euros day.

MrBife

Often wondered if they are selling more than just oranges

RichardHenshall

https://britgirldiary.com/2013/10/29...e-marketplace/

algarveandroid

East Algarve has an explosion of polytunnels for soft fruit , with that illegal labour.

There is also one family buying up any land possible for Oranges that are flat enough land , thus easy and cheap to use machinery on , thus no manpower wages . You can find them all around the olhao to Tavira North of the 125.

Last couple of years there has been hard investment even into the serras for oranges too with new terracing.

I noticed this industrial planting a few years ago , when there was investment going in by councils for water and road improvement/widening , said to a few friends you watch someone is in deep locally with the politico classes gearing up for corporate farming - sure enough they were. But the locals assumed it was just EU funds to give them better water - where farm and golf course water is cheap , house water not so much.

Now the co ops are powerless , empty in comparison to 20 years ago , the one or two families buying up flat land , some with rubble houses they have no interest in keeping or developing , do direct to supermarket sales and juicers out with the co ops.... pusing out the small farmer and buying up the land.

After the fires , yeah I know which ones they do happen frequently , the hills have been sown with the twice yearly carob in some places , paid for or supplied by the councils. The theory was they would keep scrub down , preventing fire , along with the registration of land... but even today a large portion still hasnt been registered in case there is a) due tax , and b) fining for fires .... but many will still try to tell you its because there is many familial owners , which is bull , I know at least one of the plots neighboring me is wealthy owned by one guy , with no interest in farming being that wealth.... and has never once cleared it or logged it for ownership.

There is no commercial interest in local non industrial farming , there is no money to be made from it.

MY 75 yo neighbours , whom still have their parents alive , work many hectares , for mostly olives , and where the best land is reserved for personal veg and fruit accounting for about 2 of those acres - not hectares. Both are still working , wife constantly clears the land , with a strimmer from morning to dusk several months of the year , and where the olives are being no longer income but to only pay for clearing of the wider land holding costs. They have two small buildings as homes , and where garages are bigger than the homes.

These same honest friendly people love that life , their children and grand children have no interest - but will arrive during fires I give them that , god forbid they would have to take them in or give them loans to rebuild. We are the young ones in the village , the youngest to have moved in in probably 20 years , and we arent young.

Others in that time have arrived , left , thinking of yurts , artist retreats , of property rentals , holidays out of the box , raiki and horse treks are but a few , and seen it is too hard - and that was before the financial crisis. They have started or taken over cafes , restaurants , and then left. Those left now that were born here have no money to leave , this is why they farm , its for food , on pensions without credit thinking that anyone with exterior lighting is wealthy , as they have seen it worse , they remember pre 74 and growing up proper poor - thus still think they are rich in comparison.