Beautiful But Deadly.(over-farming of olives)(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)

In ancient times, to eat an olive was to touch the gods. The Greeks believed it was Athena, goddess of wisdom and war, who gave mankind the divine fruit. They used it to anoint their bodies. The Romans, too, coveted the precious crop, and later the Venetians, who shipped it around the Mediterranean from Palestine to Morocco and Spain. Civilizations have changed but not our appetites. We moderns cherish the olive for our health, a staple of garden salads and organically correct cooking. But while the olive may be good for body and soul, it turns out it isn't so good for the land.

Environmentalists warn that humanity's love for olives may be dangerously misplaced. Yes, few things are quite so pleasant as a drive along the coasts of Portugal or Greece, where the land is rich with olive groves, leaves shimmering in the wind. But truth be told, Homer's sylvan glades are becoming something of a pest. In recent decades a growing number of farmers (not to mention rapacious multinational agro- conglomerates) are mass-producing the once rare tree. All around the Mediterranean, huge olive plantations are sucking the soil dry, depleting nutrients, producing near-deserts and endangering indigenous flora and fauna. If the trend continues, predicts Richard Perkins of the Worldwide Fund for Nature, "the future will be a poisoned environment."

The problem grows from a very modern root: European Union subsidies. Olive grants make up 7 percent--or $2 billion--of the EU's Common Agricultural Policy. Because the system rewards farmers on the basis of how much they ...