The backhoes and cranes worked this Tuesday morning at the entrance to Godall, in Montsià (Tarragona) to replant the first six monumental olive trees that the Government rescued from two nurseries in the region.
The council will mark the surroundings to tell the story of these olive trees and does not rule out creating “a small dry stone museum” to reinforce this oletourism asset.
The olive trees are part of a set of 48 that will be replanted in nine spaces in eight towns in Montsià, a purchase that was allowed by protection law 6/2020.
The standard will be finalized once the catalog of specimens is finished, with which it will also be possible to determine and distribute aid to the owners. The regulations have allowed preventive immobilizations to be carried out.
The olive trees that have already begun to be replanted in Montsià cost the Government 644,100 euros. With the approval of Law 6/2020 on the protection and conservation of monumental olive trees, their commercialization was prohibited and these fifty specimens have been rescued from two nurseries in the region.
“First a selection was made to see those who were from here and those who were millennials”, said Jesús Gómez, director of the territorial services of Climate Action in the Terres de l’Ebre.
Once acquired, they spoke with the mayors to find spaces to carry out the replanting, “places that respected the characteristics of the olive trees” and above all that dignified them, “avoiding places like roundabouts.”
As Mayor Alexis Albiol explained, in Godall they have chosen some municipal land, with easy access, to house the six monumental trees. The imposing olive trees will preside over the large esplanade that is located before reaching the cemetery.
The remaining 42 will be distributed in seven other municipalities, eight in Santa Bàrbara, four in Amposta, one in Masdenverge, five in Alcanar, twenty in Ulldecona – four of them on a GEPEC- EdC farm -, two in Freginals and two in Mas of Barberans. As the director of Acció Climàtica’s territorial services in the Ebro has pointed out, the tender was delayed and this has postponed the transplant, which will last, in some cases, until February.
Returning the monumental olive trees to their place of origin is “one of the three great legs” of the law, according to Gómez. The second will be to be able to send aid for its conservation to its owners and managers. We must complete the catalog of copies, scheduled for this month of December, and also finish deploying the law with its regulations and the panel of experts, also starting next year.
The regulations have also allowed immobilization of trees that were intended to be uprooted and marketed in an inappropriate manner. The Rural Agents have detected at least three farms where this was about to happen and it has been prevented.
The mayor of Godall, who is also president of the municipality’s agricultural cooperative, recalled that beyond the protection of trees, farmers need financial support from the administration, because monumental trees “are quite unproductive”, they bear little fruit. . “Marketing this oil, and all oils, costs a lot and cannot be sold cheaply, because harvesting has a high cost and produces little product,” he insisted. Promoting this product beyond gourmet channels is also one of the challenges that these subsidies can encourage.
