My name is Tommaso, I am 28 years old, and for the past two years I have started a small farm, Azienda Agricola Le Querce, producing high quality extra virgin olive oil from around 1,500 olive trees.

Due to ongoing climate change, central and southern Italy have been hit by an unprecedented drought this year.

To call the situation drastic is a compliment: overall from January 2024 to today in Abruzzo, where my farm is located, there has been a rainfall deficit of -87.7 per cent, and the situation in Puglia, the home of olives, is identical (not to mention Sicily).

Italy is literally split in two, with the north scourged by continuous thunderstorms and, in the rest of Italy, not only not a single drop of rain, but also boiling temperatures for three whole summer months, which have dried out the soils to a depth of 1.5 metres.

The roots of the centuries-old olive trees barely reach these depths, but even they cannot withstand such a prolonged period without water. The olive trees, unable to hold their fruit, sacrifice it, taking up the water inside them to try to hold out again and again, until the next rain, which, punctually, is late in coming.

With the remaining, very dry olives, on the one hand the quality rises, with a higher concentration of polyphenols, but for the producer it is a big problem because little oil comes out, as the pulp has not swelled properly.

With a drop in production that already stands at around 40/50%, which could go as high as 60% if the rain does not continue, the situation is unsustainable. And for next year (2025/2026), further price rises are already forecast: the olive tree bears fruit on the branch born in the previous spring, but this branch, if there is little rain, either does not sprout, or sprouts and remains short, quantitatively lowering the following year's harvest.

With these hot extremes each year

- the producer works harder to remedy the water stress in some way, even if only minimally;

- The consumer pays more each year because there is a scarcity of product;

- The farmer in the end always earns something less than the previous year.

To remedy this, I plan to dig a well that will provide enough water in the years to come, in the hope of finding groundwater that accumulated tens/hundreds of years ago. To drill this well and make an irrigation system to bring water to the olive trees, I have been quoted around €30,000. I would be truly honoured if you, with your help, could make it possible for my business to continue, because otherwise, without water, it would be unsustainable to go on and I would have to change jobs. That is why I would like to try to ask for help for 2/3 of the project.

In this way I hope to ensure the survival of the olive trees in the coming years on the one hand, and an extra virgin olive oil that no longer goes up in price on the other.

A final note: in my own small way, following the annual life cycle of the olives (but not only) and being in direct contact with the soil every day, I feel free to say that every year it gets harder to fight against a climate gone mad. Many people have advised me to change jobs because fighting today's weather is like playing scratch cards every year, and punctually losing. Unfortunately, climate change is there, and you can see it. And it worsens at an alarming rate. But I don't give up, I always think 'I'll make up for it next year!'