Feature: Italy preparing tough measures to save olive groves from foreign bacteria

In the sleepy south of Puglia, the usual sense of calm has been replaced in the past 12 months by rising panic as one of its most important industries finds itself under attack.

A foreign invader is destroying the region's precious olive groves. And now, in the next few weeks, Puglia will prepare to make a last-ditch stand to save them.

This week experts from the Mediterranean Agricultural Insittute of Bari said that a strain of the bacteria Xylella fastidiosa from Costa Rica, in central America, was almost certainly responsible for the crisis in the olive groves.

In the Salento, the southern half of the region (which forms the heel on the "boot" of Italy), around 1 million trees, or 12 percent of groves, are now infected.

Many of Puglia's most ancient trees, some 500 years old, are succumbing to the infection, which sees the plants dry out and become incapable of fruiting; very often only withered stumps are left.

The cost so far of the outbreak, in terms of lost trees alone, is around 300 million euros(323.94 million U.S. dollars). But without drastic action, experts say this figure will rise sharply, and the olive trees plague could devastate the local economy.

Puglia produces about 11 million tonnes of olives a year, more than a third of the national crop. The region's oils are among Italy's most prized, ranging from sweet, delicate and golden products to the rich, green and robust oils that chefs use for roasting.

Coldiretti, the national agricultural organization, has said that with so much at stake, olive growers should prepare for radical measures to contain the epidemic, particularly in the worst-affected area in the province of Lecce.

But already some locals fear the cure might be more dangerous than the disease.

The European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety, Vytenis Andriukaitis, has said that the EC expects drastic action to ensure the disease does not pass beyond the confines of Puglia into other parts of Italy, and even other Southern European countries.

In blunt terms, this means destroying every tree that may be infected. Andriukaitis has admitted the actions will be "painful." "We have to be very clear: all the trees infected by the bacteria Xylella fastidiosa have to be removed and this is the first thing," he said.

Enrico Brivio, the senior European Commission (EC) health and food safety spokesman, said that "eradication, buffer zones and a strict limits on movement of young trees" would form the core of the updated measures that are expected to be approved within the next three weeks.

Il Fatto Quotidiano newspaper noted that by this criterion, it would be necessary to remove thousands of other trees, such as almond, cherry and apricot, which can also harbor the pathogen.

But in one ray of light, the Italian government has assured other worried European countries -- most notably the French -- that the strain of Xylella attacking Puglia olive trees does not appear to be hostile to vines. And the end of the March, the EC is expected to announce new plans to compensate olive growers hit by the crisis.

The Italian authorities appear to be taking a different line or at least softer tone than the EC.

Giuseppe Silletti, the commissioner sent from Rome to manage the crisis, has emphasized that any action taken will be designed to cause minimal environmental damage in the Salento.

He said: "Action will be targeted and not hostile to the environment, adding that the eradication techniques would be "surgical" to avoid unnecessary removal of health trees, and he added that pesticides to kill the insects that spread the bacteria, rather than herbicides to kill infected trees, would be used.

EC officials say, however, the revised plan for tackling the disease will be a tougher version of the instructions Europe gave Italy in February 2014, which included the destruction all infected trees.

European inspections in November last year suggested that Puglian olive growers were flouting the EC rules strictly limiting the transport of young trees around the region. One official, who did not wish to be named, said that "had the Italians gone all out for eradication and followed the rules a year ago, then the situation probably wouldn't have got has bad as it is now."

Nonetheless, some experts in the region still think that containment or treatment may allow trees to be saved rather than destroyed.

Prof. Francesco Lops, who studies plant diseases at Foggia University, said: "It's only natural that signs of the disease -- the drying out -- frighten people. But we're investigating whether it's possible to help olive trees resist this infection."

He says the illness is more complex that a simple bacterial infection. Prof. Lops believed fungal pathogens may also be involved. His team hopes that chemicals or friendly bacteria can be used to encourage the olive trees to produce extra quantities of natural pathogen-fighting substances, which well help them resist the disease. But he notes that such research "takes time." And time is something that is in short supply.

The EC's Brivio said: "We are aware of this theory suggested by some Italian experts, that the disease affects only the weaker trees, and that it can be prevented by giving them certain chemicals.

"But this is not what our experts are saying. I know the ancient olive trees of have a special place in the culture of southern Puglian life. But we have to act now before the situation gets out of hand." Endit