The development of olive culture has been slow and it has grown in line with the population development, particularly in the Andean area, where today are located the provinces of La Rioja, Catamarca, Salta, Mendoza and San Juan.

At the end of the 19 th century, olive products were in great demand – especially olive oil and table olives preserved in brine – due to the massive arrival of immigrants of latin origin.

Spanish civil war (1936/1939) had widespread repercussions throughout international commerce. On September 29 of the year 1932, Argentine government launched a promotion program for the oil sector with the law 11. 643, so that the serious situation and the provisioning problems could be mitigated.

As a result of this law, the provinces where precipitations were lower than 400 mm per year and had possibilities of irrigation, would be helped an restructured to the oil producer sector, including some wine sectors that were in marked crisis.

Towards 1965, Argentina had almost five million olive plants distributed in different provinces, which had different and singular agrarian and weather conditions. Most of them were situated in Andean areas, like Mendoza, San Juan, San Luis, Catamarca, La Rioja and others like Buenos Aires, Córdoba and Entre Rios.

Nowadays, the cultivated surface in Argentina is of about 79.000 hectares, averaged 350 plants per hectare. According to the plantations regime applied in our country, the total quantity of olive plants would be of about 27.650.000 units.