In Benalua de las Villas the plant's commercial director, Jose Antonio Caceres Ortega, agrees the industry is facing "a perfect storm".
"Over the next five to 10 years, 80 per cent of the small olive oil producers are going to disappear," he estimates. "On top of that, fewer young farmers are taking the place of their parents in the fields. We've got people trying to come back [to rural Spain] from the building industry - which has collapsed - to what they thought was a sure-fire profitable job. But agriculture in its current state isn't profitable."
In Seville alone, where it is reported that 83 of its 105 villages are dependent on it, 6500 farmers have abandoned the business in the past decade. In Granada, with the country's third highest olive oil output, trade unions estimated last week that since 2000, 75 per cent of the province's farms have drained their savings accounts to zero. One official says that without the EU grants more than 70 per cent of Granada's farmers now face ruin.
Ortega recognises that his trade has partly been hoist with its own petard.
"Each year we've beaten the world record in terms of production, [and] there's too much on offer."
This has led major Spanish supermarket chains constantly to use olive oil as a loss-leader, to tempt customers and keep prices low.
"At the same time, the big purchasers of olive oil have created a monopoly. During this year's harvest, prices have already fallen by the maximum possible. Buyers exploit the fact the processing plants are full to bursting. So you get bad sales. It's the worst possible facet of the law of supply and demand."
Ortega believes that although the industry is on the point of losing its traditional smallholding sector, mass production could save its future. His processing plant is already adapting its infrastructure in anticipation.
If his fellow farmers heed that warning, it would imply a huge drop in rural employment levels and a huge blow to Spain's traditional, and already dwindling, agricultural communities.
If he is wrong, the chances are tourists will only be able to witness olive harvests in science parks like Granada's, as a fading relic of Spain's past: all in all, a bleak crossroads for the country's rural life.
- Independent