COBRAM Estate Olives has produced 10 million litres of oil in its “off year” harvest that wrapped up at the weekend.
The largest grove spread across more than 3500 hectares is at Boort where the company’s new production mill was used for a second season extracting oil.
More 55,000 tons of olives were picked this year at Boort, Boundary Bend and Wemen.
Production from its own groves was 9.4 million litres and another 700,000 litres of third-party olive oil will also be marketed by the company.
Joint CEOs Leandro Ravetti and Sam Beaton said: “Due to the natural biennial cycle of olive oil yields, 2024 was, as expected, a lower-crop year ‘off year’ in our Australian olive groves. The colder and shorter than average growing season in the 2023 financial year ended up having a widespread negative impact for the Australian olive industry 2024 harvest, particularly in the Eastern seaboard where this year’s production, excluding CBO, is expected to be approximately 54 per cent lower than last year and 43 per cent lower than in 2022. 
“Despite this, our total production was three per cent  higher than our last ‘off-year’ harvest in 2022. 
“This was also pleasing given the short-term reduction of yields associated with the completion of our replanting program removing nearly 100,000 adult trees and replacing them with more productive varieties.”
Mr Ravetti and Mr Beaton said the olive oil quality was very good and the company would have sufficient supply to meet its packaged goods sales plan through to the 2025 harvest.
“After this year’s favourable season, the company’s Australian olive trees are in good condition, noting 2025 is an ‘on-year’ for our Australian olive groves, with the crop expecting to be significantly higher than in 2024 subject to the normal risks associated with agricultural production,” they said.
Cobram Estate is also expecting good yields from its ‘off-year’ season at groves in the United State. “Flowering for the 2024 crop commenced early in May on most Californian groves, with full bloom at our groves occurring during the second and third week of that month,” the company said.
“Winter and spring weather conditions were favourable for flower induction and fruit set and pleasingly we now expect our 2024 crop, an ‘off year’, to be similar to or above our 2023 harvest ‘on year’ (3.2 million litres of olive oil).“
Cobram Estate is predicting $60 million earnings before tax for the financial year, up almost $20 million. Results will be announced to the Australian Stock Exchange in August