The kumquat harvest is currently in full swing in the Axarquía region, in southern Spain, where Mathias and Tinna, who are managing the biodynamic project Giallo Royal, were pioneers in the cultivation of this fruit. "Kumquat is a bit of an eccentric product, and in Europe, it tends to be highly appreciated during the Christmas period. However, after working with this product in southern Spain for over 20 years, we have managed to sell it regularly outside of that period, achieving stable demand throughout the entire campaign, which comes to a close in April."
"Kumquat is a product that requires high specialization to know when to harvest the fruit at the right stage of ripeness during the three production seasons, and all our clients trust that Giallo Royal will provide them with the best fruit. In fact, we have gained clientele. We now cover all Scandinavian countries and have established ourselves in France, where we have managed to keep kumquat in the programs for the months of January, February, and March."
"The agricultural sector must seek to restore balance with the environment"
Giallo Royal doesn't cultivate only kumquat. The company, based in the municipality of Torre del Mar, is specialized in the cultivation of tropical and subtropical products produced under biodynamic agriculture; a concept linked to anthroposophy that seeks to restore balance between agricultural productions and the soil and its environment. "In my opinion, the agricultural sector must seek to restore that balance. In other activities, such as fishing, there are stops at certain times to allow the populations to recover, while in agriculture, the production continues intensively with fertilizers and supplements, because the soil and the plants themselves are depleted. We should keep in mind that even drought is a consequence of an imbalance in our planet due to pollution, and that this is what is causing climate change," says Mathias.
"With biodynamic agriculture, we also seek to open consumers' minds, making their thinking freer and more sensitive, and to recover the emotional factor in consumption. There are studies showing that if a product is placed at a certain height in the supermarket, the customer tends to buy it just because it is in that spot. Ultimately, in some way, we lose our freedom to choose and it seems that consumers are treated more like cattle or robots than like people."
"Our biodynamic products are cultivated without any toxic substances, with minimal fertilization making use of our own biodynamic preparations, with which we have managed to protect and bring balance to our fields, and continue producing even in this period of drought. It should be noted that the water we are using for irrigation in the Axarquía does not have the optimal quality for the trees, but thanks to our preparations, the trees have become immune to external influences and have remained strong enough to maintain a stable production."
"Our clients highly appreciate our biodynamic fruits for their quality, for the values they represent, and because they have also found that their shelf life is much longer than that of conventional products, since they do not grow rapidly and forcedly with additives. They also do not degrade as quickly. In the case of kumquat, in fact, we are seeing an impressive demand for such an eccentric product."
For more information:
Giallo Royal
Calle Los Prados N.º 2
Local 3-6
29740 Torre del Mar, Málaga, Spain
Tel.: +34 609 543 474
[email protected]
https://gialloroyal.com