L'olivo: elemento del paesaggio culturale

The Mediterranean area is an area characterized by a high biodiversity. In it concentrates 16% of plant species existing significant percentage when you consider that only 2.25% of the land are regions having a Mediterranean climate, where the territory of the Mediterranean basin presents greater extent. The olive tree is a fundamental element of the natural vegetation of the Mediterranean environment and characterizes the natural landscape and, starting from the fourth millennium BC (Zohary and Hopf, 1993), anthropic. Olive farming has often involved modifications geomorphology (terrace) in specific parts of the territory, which have not only allowed the preservation of the delicate water balance of the slopes but are an element of historical and cultural heritage of the Mediterranean populations. The terraces are the fundamental elements of the cultural landscape. Farina (2000) defines this landscape "a geographical area where human activities and environmental trends have been integrated so as to create ecological models and control mechanisms that determine the presence, distribution and abundance of species" and therefore strongly influenced by human activity and employee. Cultural landscapes are areas where their impact is significant due to anthropogenic changes of land use, for replacement of the biological communities and the remarkable input of energy subsidiary made (Massa et al., 2004).