Acesur

The educational program El Olivar-Educando en la alimentación del futuro (“The Olive grove – Educating in the future of food”) helps to approach Andalusian students of Primary Education to the olive oil culture, which is one of the determining elements of Spanish and Andalusian identity, developing their skills in relation to the process, the environment, the properties of olive oil, etc. It is essential to bring the olive oil culture into the classroom as a valuable gastronomic, economic, cultural and social legacy to transmit to the new generations.

El Olivar is an innovative project that provides to the teaching community educational resources in digital format to address content related to the world of olive groves with the students of Primary Education. With this program the olive grove is studied as ecosystem and strategic productive sector in our economy and our culture, as well as the importance of olive oil consumption, a pillar of the Mediterranean diet, considered World Heritage by UNESCO.

This educational program intends to become into an essential tool to help teachers in their important task of educating future citizenship.

The program is created to achieve the following objectives:

- Motivate the participants to discover the wealth socio-environmental of the olive grove, valuing the environmental, social and economic benefits that it provides.

- Increase the level of industry knowledge of the olive grove and oil culture, promoting a transversal vision of it, by linking it with various subject areas.

- Encourage discovery and enjoy the products of olive grove, with special attention in relation to health and Mediterranean diet.

- Offer resources to promote critical thinking.

- Encourage participation of educational centers in the improvement and conservation of environmental and cultural heritage.

As a result f the program, Andalusian children improve their knowledge about the production process of olive oil, about the properties of different varieties of olive oil and the benefits of consumption of olive oil. In a long term, those children will probably be consumers and buyers of olive oil.

In addition, participants learn how is the actual olive oil production process and which was the process centuries ago. Therefore, Andalusian children are approached to the olive oil as one of the elements that define the Spanish sociocultural identity.

Results:

- Participants: 276 elementary school children

- Direct contact: 673 schools

- Area of action: 346 Andalusian municipalities

- Activities: 2 events, 3 workshops