Agrifood Comunicación and AgroBank, with the collaboration of the Olive Oil World Congress, have presented the 2025 Olive Oil Report, which confirms how Spain is strengthening its international leadership in this strategic sector. The 2024/25 season marks a turning point after two very short harvests, with production exceeding 1.4 million tons and once again positioning the country as the driving force of the European and global market.
The report, which can be downloaded from the following link: https://www.agrobankhub.es/actualidad/informes-sectoriales.html , provides a detailed analysis of the evolution of the global, European, and national markets, as well as the structural situation of Spanish olive groves.
Global leadership in production and area
Worldwide, production forecast for the 2024/25 season stands at 3.5 million tons, the highest figure in the historical series. Sixty percent will come from European Union countries and 40% from non-EU countries. In this context, Spain’s contribution is once again decisive: its 1.4 million tons represent 67% of European production and 40% of global production. The report also explains that olive groves now span 58 countries and cover 11.7 million hectares, of which 2.7 million are located in Spain, confirming its absolute leadership.
At the European level, the European Union maintains an extraordinarily positive trade balance. The 2023/24 season closed with a surplus of 4.39 billion euros, the highest on record. Although a decline in export value is expected for 2024/25 due to lower prices, levels will remain very high. The report notes that this export strength is accompanied by an expanding global consumption, which has stabilized since 2019 at around 3 million tons—1.42 million in the EU and 1.64 million outside it.
The study also highlights the social and productive importance of Spanish olive groves. With around 400,000 owners and more than 2.4 million hectares, it is a key crop for thousands of rural municipalities. Sixty-nine percent of the area corresponds to rainfed olive groves, many of them low-yield or located on steep slopes. At the same time, more than 35,000 hectares of super-intensive olive groves in Andalusia and more than 15,000 in Extremadura stand out, having driven modernization based on mechanization, efficiency, and technology. In hedgerow plantations, with densities of 1,600 to 2,000 trees per hectare, yields of 10,000 to 12,000 kg per hectare can be achieved, and mechanized harvesting reduces costs to 0.03–0.04 euros per kilo.
Nevertheless, the report warns of the structural challenges faced by traditional rainfed olive groves on slopes, which have much higher costs—close to 5 euros per kilo of oil—and increasingly compromised profitability. The 2023–2027 CAP includes specific aid for these farms, aimed at ensuring their continuity in areas particularly vulnerable to depopulation.
The industrial weight of the sector is reflected in the 1,835 mills, 1,784 bottling plants, 64 pomace extractors, and 25 refineries existing in Spain in 2023. Added to this is the growing push for quality, evident in the 30 PDOs, 2 PGIs, and 284,000 hectares of organic olive groves—one of the largest organic areas in the world for this crop.
Falling prices and strong export performance
As for the national market, the report notes that the 2022/23 and 2023/24 seasons were marked by exceptionally high prices due to extremely low production. Currently, Extra Virgin Olive Oil stands at around 420 euros per 100 kilos, a decline of 46.7% compared with the previous season. In Andalusia, prices have fallen 42% compared to 2023/24 and 49% compared to the 2022/23 peak; in Castilla-La Mancha, the drop reaches 48%. Other categories—virgin, lampante, and pomace oil—have also recorded significant reductions.
In foreign trade, Spain maintains a pattern of strength. The average exports of the last five seasons reach 919,300 tons, and the value can exceed 5 billion euros, with coverage ratios above 800%. Italy, the United States, France, Portugal, and the United Kingdom are the main destinations. The report identifies as the main structural weakness the fact that more than 60% of exports are shipped in bulk, especially to Italy, where the oil is bottled and re-exported with greater added value.
From a short-term perspective, the 2024/25 season began with very low stocks—296,000 tons, 27% less than the previous year—but the production recovery will lead to an increase in ending stocks to around 423,000 tons, 30% more than in 2023/24. This greater availability is putting downward pressure on prices. In the most recent weeks analyzed, virgin olive oil has recorded a 3.73% decline, while the other categories show a similar trend.
Despite this context, prospects for the Spanish sector remain positive. Production forecast for the 2025/26 season is 1.37 million tons, a figure very similar to the previous year. The report concludes that Spain maintains solid foundations to continue leading the global olive oil market: dominant production capacity, an extensive industrial network, strong export weight, expanding global consumption, and olive grove modernization advancing in both efficiency and sustainability.
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