Saline Waters: new studies for olive orchards
Several studies have evaluated the effects of climate change on water demand in agriculture. A new study conducted by researchers of the Life Sciences Institute at Sant’Anna School has investigated the quantity and the quality of irrigation saline water for olive oil production.
As well as advancing our knowledge of olive tree as a salt tolerant species, a major output from the study was to understand the impact of future climate drivers on irrigation requirements and soil salinity. Results show that olive trees can be irrigated with water containing (up to 3200 mg/l) salt and salinity is associated with reduction of photosynthesis in olives. A better selection of salt tolerant olive genotypes and mitigation strategies (amount of water and timing together with blending irrigation water of different quality) can be adopted for sustainable production.
The paper published in Plant Physiology and Biochemistry journal titled The Effect of saline irrigation on physiological traits, fatty acid composition and desaturase genes expression in olive fruit mesocarp, is co-authored by Samuele Moretti, Alessandra Francini, Luca Sebastiani, Luisa Hernández and José M.Martínez-Rivas from the Instituto de la Grasa (Csic – Seville).
Click here for download the paper
The opening photo is by the DOP Garda Olive Oil Consortium and refers to olive groves in the Garda area.
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