God save the Taggiasca!
The Taggiasca variety owes its name to the monks of Taggia who planted the first cuttings, received by the monks of San Colombano from the island of the monastery of Lerino, in their monastery of Taggia. Lerino is a small archipelago of islands located in the Costa Azzura facing Nice. The same variety of olives is also widespread in the Costa Azzurra between Menton and Nice with the name of nicoise (Nicoise). 99% of the trees that are present in the province of Imperia are of the Taggiasca variety. The Cultivar Taggiasca is a type of olive of medium or small dimensions, whose color when fully ripe is black tending to blue. The value of this oil derives both from the particular organoleptic characteristics of the product and from the unique context of the production area.
The value of the Taggiasca
Our farm currently cultivates about 2500 trees of Taggiasca. The area of cultivated olive grove is 8 hectares and the production is on average around 6000 liters. The economy of the hinterland was closely linked to the production of oil until the 1950s. Since the 1960s the low wholesale prices and the low remuneration that olive production gave to farmers has led many families to abandon olive groves, inland areas and migrate to coastal areas or large cities.
o understand the value of this product you need to know our land. The terraces, the dry-stone walls, the steep slopes where the olive trees cling, make it impossible to mechanize the work. All the operations of mowing, pruning, fertilizing and harvesting are still done by hand.
In addition to the economic value of agricultural production, we must also recognize the great environmental value of olive growing in Liguria. Today it is only thanks to the tireless activity of the Ligurian Farmes who still cultivate the Taggiasca in the province of Imperia, that the inland area is preserved and saved from environmental degradation.
These factors: high organoleptic quality and quantitatively limited production with high production costs, explain why our extra virgin olive oil is positioned in a high price range compared to the national average.
