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Circular Economy in Olive Oil Industry: The Case of Greece

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Handbook of Sustainability Science in the Future

Abstract

In recent years, the unsustainability of the modern economic model, which reflects a system of production that surge the amount of adverse material flow and depletes earth’s resources, has been recognized. Hence, a “circular economy” (CE) has grown into a noteworthy way to reach sustainable development. Concerning the agri-food sector, CE principally implies reduction of the quantities of waste generated during the production process, by utilizing the food waste and by-products and recycling the nutrients by growers and industries. The production of olive oil is a vital sector of agri-food industry for the Mediterranean countries, with an average production of almost 3 million tons of olive oil annually and almost 3.3 million olive producers. Despite the fact that it is an economic activity with great importance for the region, because of the generation of significant amounts of liquid and solid wastes during the extraction process, it is an activity with remarkable environmental impact as well.

The principal aim of this chapter is to highlight the urgent need for transforming the linear model into a circular one in the case of olive oil production, given that the global demands for olive oil on the one hand and the generated volumes of waste and by-products on the other hand are considerable. Linear model is an economic model where converting of natural resources into waste via production occurs, which means that products are manufactured and then consumed and rejected as waste, degrading the environment. Not only does this manuscript present some of the valuable products that can be obtained from the olive oil industry, but also it suggests its utilization. In addition, after an extensive literature review, this paper aims to examine whether CE could be implemented in Greek olive oil mills. This would be an important development, as Greece is one of the four European countries that produce totally 12.5 million tons olive oil, which means more than 95% of the total EU production.

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Correspondence to Aristea Kounani .

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Kounani, A., Pavloudi, A., Aggelopoulos, S. (2023). Circular Economy in Olive Oil Industry: The Case of Greece. In: Leal Filho, W., Azul, A.M., Doni, F., Salvia, A.L. (eds) Handbook of Sustainability Science in the Future. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-68074-9_166-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-68074-9_166-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-68074-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-68074-9

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Earth and Environm. ScienceReference Module Physical and Materials ScienceReference Module Earth and Environmental Sciences

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