The olive commodity spread in ancient times hand in hand with western civilization in the Mediterranean basin. It was till recently and in many regions still is a highly traditionally cultivated commodity. Table olives were subjected about 200 years ago to irrigation and intensification. This was unacceptable in olive cultivation for oil extraction. During the last century the economy of the olive industry declined and became questionable. A drastic increase in efficiency of the olive oil industry was obligatory for its survival. In the nineteen fifties, an approach to intensify the olive oil industry was initiated using irrigation and modern nutrition. The initial results indicated a significant increase in production without reducing oil quality. Slight changes in taste occurred occasionally due to quantitative changes of some oil constituents but oil quality was not affected. Some of these oils gained high prizes in international competitions. Some cultivars responded to irrigation better than others regarding growth, fruit yield and relative oil content. Thus, selection and breeding of responsive cultivars to intensification was initiated. Once responsive cultivars were identified and planted commercially in pioneering orchards, a revolution of the olive oil industry was initiated. An increase in both fruit and oil yield up to more than five times that in traditional orchards was achieved. This increased production and tree uniformity initiated the development of new orchard systems, advanced mechanization and oil mill technologies reducing manual labor. This attracted large scale orchard development in traditional, new and marginal regions. Basis on this development it can be concluded that the introduction of irrigation revolutionized the world's olive oil industry from a traditional barely economic one to a thriving modern economical developing industry.
