Pájara plans an olive oil mill to boost Majorero oil and enrich its cultural route

Pájara aims to open a new future line for the municipality’s primary sector through olive cultivation. The town council is developing a project for an olive oil mill in the Toto‑Pájara area, an initiative linked to a collaboration agreement with Baena, a Cordoban municipality with a long olive‑oil tradition and a protected designation of origin boasting “more than 200 years of solera” in olive‑oil production, explained Pepe Díaz, councilor for the Primary Sector, during the FEAGA celebration. Accompanied by deputy mayor Alexis Alonso, they noted that work is also underway to recover the traditional tomato seed.

The proposal is driven by the desire to leverage the technical expertise of a leading region in the sector and to provide Fuerteventura’s farmers with new tools for diversifying production.

“It is an exchange of technologies,” Díaz emphasized, adding the need to “use that knowledge to try to bring it here to our farmers.”

The project is not envisioned solely as a productive infrastructure but also as an integral part of the ethnographic route Pájara is designing to showcase its history, agricultural landscape, and traditional crafts.

The future mill would join other heritage and productive sites in the municipality, such as the Toto winery, which is “about to start operating,” the Noria, the Tahona, and the Ajuy estate, a place Díaz highlighted as “rich with history.”

The council wants the mill to serve as a reference point for farmers who have already embraced olive cultivation.

“There are many farms with many olive trees in the municipality,” said deputy mayor Alexis Alonso, who defended the crop’s potential in an area long dominated by tomatoes but now seeking more profitable and suitable alternatives.

Alonso stressed that the municipality does not wish to lose its agricultural roots, but rather to move toward a model focused on less quantity and more quality.

“We have lost product quality for quantity,” he affirmed, recalling the historic significance of the majorero tomato, a product that once “was exported to Germany and England, and whose traditional seed we now aim to recover.”

The council is betting on the sector’s future.

“With this mill, it is a project for the future. We need to prepare people and find the right location,” Alonso explained.

The initiative will be accompanied by technical workshops and training actions aimed not only at local farmers but also at the island’s broader community. The council is also working on a future cheese and olive‑oil fair, aiming to unite two products capable of generating identity, local economy, and tourist appeal.

The project fits within a broader strategy to connect the primary sector with gastronomy, tourism, and zero‑kilometer products. Alonso highlighted that an increasing number of visitors are looking for more than just sun and beach:

“It is tourism of sensations, of flavors, of learning about our history, our identity, the cooking of our grandmothers.”