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Olive trees and landscape

[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]The Alto Palancia landscape should be considered as a melting pot of typical western Mediterranean landscapes, with ecological and cultural values to be conserved, promoted and recovered as a first-rate heritage resource for the sustainability of the territory. The rural landscape woven by natural traces is probably the most widespread and valued in this environment, with its great variety of nuances and formal and agricultural diversity, dotted with traditional architectural constructions such as farmhouses and corrals.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text css=».vc_custom_1627640502310{margin-top: 24px !important;}»]The vineyard, the olive tree and the wheat have been the three crops that have covered the structure of the study area throughout history, with one or the other predominant and other crops such as almond and carob or horticultural and fruit trees appearing in function of the geomorphological and climatic conditions of each zone. The subsistence of the population historically was largely covered by the production of wine, oil and bread, complemented by other types of cereals and by vegetables, legumes and fruit trees that the benign climate and land allowed to establish, this created a mosaic characteristic landscape of the Mediterranean area.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text css=».vc_custom_1627640507851{margin-top: 24px !important;}»]Furthermore, in some areas of the region, such as the southern slope, the agricultural space is organized into large cultivated areas separated by others that are not, constituting isolated units that resemble a cellular structure. The population tended to disperse in these hard-to-reach areas building farmhouses, such as those of Abanillas, Rejo, Cucalón, Ferrer, Valero, etc., which constitute the human center that made possible the exploitation of the territory, (ARROYO ILERA, 1981).[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text css=».vc_custom_1627640395250{margin-top: 24px !important;}»]The phylloxera crisis at the end of the 19th century produced the first great modification in the landscape of the Mediterranean trilogy, practically disappearing the cultivation of the vine. Industrialization, the appearance of new markets and new communication routes already in the 20th century, led to a gradual abandonment of the rest of the crops, with the consequent modification of the landscape. Nowadays, it is the olive tree that has reached the greatest extension, reintroducing the cultivation of the vine in small viticultural farms in recent years, leaving the cereal concentrated in the western highlands.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text css=».vc_custom_1627640418935{margin-top: 24px !important;}»]The richness of this plot, the variety of colors and textures caused by this trilogy of crops is gradually disappearing today, homogenizing and simplifying the agrarian mosaic due to the concentration of crops, appearing others such as citrus in the southeastern part of the region and the holm oak for truffle production in the northwest. The standardization of the parcel is also due to the industrialized forms of production of the new varieties, as in the case of the almond and olive trees. The maintenance of this landscape should be ensured due to its identity and cultural character.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text css=».vc_custom_1627640436412{margin-top: 24px !important;}»]The wealth of the heritage built for its use has remained, the rural architecture of the terraces, the dry stone walls and margins that structure the territory, the wells, shelters and of course the farmhouses, constructions that have identity and symbolic values for the population. that inhabits the landscape.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text css=».vc_custom_1530175687162{margin-top: 14px !important;margin-bottom: 60px !important;}»]Sixto D. Lozano Esteban
Arquitecto y paisajista[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=»1/2″][vc_single_image image=»279″ img_size=»full» qode_css_animation=»»]