The only Australian olive oil stock, page-5

SW, bear in mind that Australian olive growers enjoy a number of significant competitive advantages over their overseas peers in Italy, California or elsewhere.

There are probably several advantages, but I think these are the three most important:

1. Season counter-cyclicality: Most of the world's agricultural land is in the northern hemisphere (think of how much farmland there is across Europe, Russia, the US or Canada, for example).

By comparison, relatively little food is produced in the southern hemisphere: Apart from Australia and New Zealand, there is only Chile and Argentina, and a few African nations.

As such, Australian growers are harvesting and/or marketing their crop at a time of year when hardly anyone else in the world is doing so, providing local growers with a distinctive competitive advantage over northern-hemisphere farmers.

2. Low population density: the second advantage is that Australia has one of the lowest population densities of any country in the world. This is important, because it means Australian growers of crops face less competition for water than their counterparts in more populated nations. In addition, the low population density means that Australian growers tend to be isolated from other industries, which helps reinforce the 'clean' reputation of Australian food.

3. Political stability: finally, it shouldn't be overlooked that Australia is a far more stable country than many of the other agricultural producers worldwide. This is particularly significant for tree crops such as olive trees, as they are a long term investment, not bearing any fruit until the third or fourth year.

For a counter example, look at Syria: not so long ago it was one of largest olive oil producers in the world, but unsurprisingly the recent conflict has resulted in significant disruption to the industry there.

Apart from that, I'd also add that olive trees just seem to grow particularly well in larges swathes of southern Australia (indeed they grow so well that in some regions that they are classed as an invasive weed).

Personally, I am an optimist regarding the Australian horticultural sector in general, I often get a sense that the potential of companies operating in this industry tends to be overlooked by local investors.