Agriculture
From The Report: Tunisia 2016
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Agriculture performed strongly in 2015, driven by outstanding production and olive oil exports, which generated nearly 920m in revenue. The sector, which accounts for around 10% of GDP, has not been spared the instability affecting the country since the 2011 revolution, prompting efforts to initiate structural reforms, including enhanced organisation to boost productivity and stabilize output. Profitability is also a concern, as farmer debt is soaring amid rising input costs. Given the role that the sector has come to occupy in securing foreign revenues and bolstering the country’s trade balance, Tunisia is set to further tap into existing assets, such as its geographical location and favorable climate, to boost exports to Europe. There is also significant potential to enhance exports to neighbouring Libya and Algeria, where non-tariff barriers are less of an impediment to trade than they are in Europe’s case. This chapter contains an interview with Abdelaziz Makhloufi, CEO, CHO Company.

Articles from this Chapter

Overview

Fertile ground: Overall growth remains strong, with stability a high priority
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With Tunisia striving to bring economic growth back on track, agriculture performed strongly in 2015, driven by outstanding production and olive oil exports, which generated TD2bn (€917.2m) in revenue. Combined with falling oil prices, this helped reduce the trade deficit from TD13.64bn (€6.3bn) in 2014 to TD1.2bn (€550.3m) in 2015. The sector, which accounts for around 10% of GDP, has not been spared the instability affecting the country since the 2011 revolution, prompting efforts to initiate…

Interview

Branching out: OBG talks to Abdelaziz Makhloufi, CEO, CHO Company
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Interview:Abdelaziz Makhloufi How is the increase of export quotas going to impact the olive oil market in Tunisia? ABDELAZIZ MAKHLOUFI: A free trade agreement between the EU and Tunisia would be beneficial for the Tunisian agriculture sector, and especially for the olive oil industry. Thus, the removal of the quotas would be a great help for the Tunisian economy. In 2016, the quotas will be extended from 56,700 tonnes per year to more than 90,000 tonnes per year. Also, since 2015, there…

Analysis

Huile of fortune: Olive oil exports saw an unprecedented rise in 2015
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Owing to favourable weather and efforts to improve sector organisation, in 2015 Tunisia was the world’s second-largest olive oil producer and its top exporter. As of October 31, 2015, coinciding with the end of the 2014/15 agricultural season, Tunisia’s 90m olive trees had returned 350,000 tonnes of olive oil. The uptick in domestic output coincided with a shortfall in global production, which fell 27% from its annual average of 3m tonnes, driving up demand for Tunisian oil. As a result the…