Today, the first 100 olive saplings were planted in the Kardzhali region. The olive garden is in Gluhar village of the Municipality of Kardzhali and the owner of the garden is Ruslan Smilyanov. The saplings were given by one of the biggest sapling producers of Greece, Sotiris Braniotis. He said: “The olives are arpekina which is one of the best species of Europe. They are produced in Spain by vitro method and raised in Greece. This Spain origin tree is durable up to -20 °C and gives olives in 3-4 years. About 10-15 kg of olives is taken from each tree and the oil ratio of those olives is high. About one liter of oil is obtained from 3 kg of olives.”
Sotiris wished the producers of the Eastern Rhodopes to choose the newest methods but also warned them to listen the agriculture specialists. Sotiris promised to visit the olive gardens every month regularly during this three year long project. The director of the project and the dean of the Kardzhali Agriculture College, Prof. Dr. Vasko Vasilev, stated that the trees will be planted to the special fields and an agreement will be signed with the farmers to buy their products. He also said that more olive saplings will be planted in Kromovgrad, Kirkovo and Cebel regions until the end of this week. In order to examine the durability of the olive trees to different climates, it is planning to plant them in different climates at different altitudes. In the autumn of 2010 more olive saplings will be planted on larger fields.