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As diverse as agriculture can be throughout Europe, it’s funny how many of the challenges are exactly the same.
In the Abruzzo region of Italy, just an hour east of Rome and high up in the Apennine mountains, is the tiny village of Anversa degli Abruzzi, which has less than 400 inhabitants.
This sleepy village is home to La Porta dei Parchi, one of the most innovative organic and agritourism farms in all of Europe.
However, as the farm’s agritourism manager Manuela Cozzi explains, La Porta dei Parchi was originally set up to try to keep people from leaving the rural area to go to the city.
“We started this business 40 years ago to try to keep people in the area,” says Cozzi.
“We started the farm with just 100 sheep, but we have since improved our breeding techniques and now we have over 1,500 sheep and 300 goats, as well as donkeys, chickens and turkeys. We now employ 15 people and milk the sheep to produce our own organic dairy products,” she adds.
Bears and wolves
One thing that is certainly very different in the Abruzzo region to most other parts of Europe is the threat to the flock.
According to Cozzi, wild saffron growing on the mountains attracts wild boars on to the farm.
Not only will the boars attack, but other predators such as wolves and bears will also attack the sheep.
To tackle this, the farm has over 40 sheepdogs constantly minding the sheep. The dogs are all of the Maremma breed, which is traditional to central Italy.
The flock is protected from wolves and bears in the mountains by Maremma sheepdogs.
“Once the pups are five to six months old, they follow their mother to learn how to protect the sheep,” says Cozzi.
“We raise the dogs alongside the lambs, so they are very protective of them. The training for the dogs is all natural through their mothers with no human involvement,” she adds.
Terrain
The Porta dei Parchi farm is set on 1,000ha of mountainous terrain that reaches as high as 1,800m above sea level.
Cozzi explains that the 1,500-strong flock of Sopravissana sheep, a traditional Italian breed, are split into three groups; the in-lamb flock, the milking flock and the dry flock.
Some of the Sopravissana lambs at Porta dei Parchi farm, Abruzzo, Italy.
Each ewe has about 100 days lactation following lambing, with the entire flock producing about 40,000 litres of milk per year. While this may seem like a small volume, the fat content in the milk is very high at 7%.
La Porta dei Parchi produces 20 different types of organic cheese on the farm, but the raw unpasteurised milk is mainly processed by hand into traditional pecorino cheese.
It takes about five litres of milk to make 1kg of cheese, meaning the farm is producing close to 8,000kg of cheese each year.
The milking parlour at Porta dei Parchi farm, Abruzzo, Italy.
Recooked
The liquid whey leftover from making the cheese is then recycled and reheated to make ricotta, a whey cheese that’s name literally means recooked.
Cozzi explains that the pecorino cheese is sold at the farmgate for close to €20/kg, with some of it exported as far as New York, where it will retail at €40/kg. Ricotta is also exported to the US and sells for close to €40/kg as well.
In this way, each sheep on the farm will produce one lamb per year, 7kg of pecorino cheese, about 7kg of ricotta and 3kg of wool.
In all, Cozzi says output per sheep per year is €190, while costs on the farm are less than €50 per sheep per year.
This is of course before you include the agritourism element of the farm. Throughout the tourist months, Cozzi says the farm will host groups of visitors or students every day, many of whom will stay in the traditional on-farm accommodation.
Porta dei Parchi farm is located on the edge of the village of Anversa degli Abruzzi in the scenic Abruzzo region of Italy.
Adopt a sheep
A unique idea begun by Cozzi and her team in 2000 was the adopt a sheep campaign, which she says is aimed at the online millennial generation.
For €190, you can adopt a sheep at Porta dei Parchi for a year and, through social media, keep up to date with life on the farm.
At the end of the 12 months, those who adopt a sheep will be sent €190 worth of cheeses and ricotta from the farm.
Since it first launched, more than 2,000 sheep have been adopted by consumers, or the equivalent of close to €40,000 in sales. Even the Italian minister for agriculture adopted a sheep.
“The minister’s surname was the Italian for shepherd. I told the minister he had to adopt a sheep as he could not be a real shepherd and not have a flock,” says Cozzi.
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