Consumers can trust the quality and value of heart-healthy imported olive oils: Study

Consumers can continue to trust the quality of the imported olive oils they buy in supermarkets throughout the United States, contrary to what the authors of a report funded by a small contingent of domestic olive oil producers would like them to believe.

For the second time within the past year, the University of California at Davis Olive Center released a report questioning the integrity of marketers of imported olive oil. The report relies on rejected chemical tests and subjective taste analyses organized and conducted by organizations aligned with Australian and California agricultural interests to try to discredit importers of products with proven track records of consistent quality.

"The report, funded by California olive oil producers and the California Olive Oil Council, was prepared by staff at the UC Davis Olive Center whose primary mission, per its website, is to enhance the economic viability of California olive oil," said Bob Bauer, president of the North American Olive Oil Association (NAOOA). UC Davis Olive Center also markets its own olive oil, thus it directly competes with the olive oil brands its "study" attempts to discredit.

"All five of the imported brands on which the report focused are marketed by members in good standing of the NAOOA," Bauer said. A condition of membership in the NAOOA is that members' products meet the olive oil standards developed by the International Olive Council (IOC), an organization formed by United Nations charter to oversee the world's olive oil sector. IOC member countries produce 97 percent of the world's olive oil supply. The NAOOA is a signatory to the IOC's quality control monitoring agreement for the U.S. and Canada. It conducts random sampling of olive oil purchased from retail and foodservice establishments throughout the U.S. and Canada for testing by IOC-accredited laboratories. The brands mentioned in the UC Davis report have been tested regularly for 20 years and have consistently met the IOC standards.

The IOC issued a statement that faulted both UC Davis studies for containing ". . .[an] evident undercurrent of aggressive, inexplicable criticism of imported olive oil quality."

The economic interests of the organizations that funded the study and support the Center bring into question the integrity of the study's findings. "That bias is reflected by the use of laboratory tests rejected by the IOC as unreliable and by the use of subjective sensory findings made by recently accredited tasting panels comprised of domestic industry representatives, many of whom have displayed extreme animosity toward imported products while trying to promote fledgling domestic agricultural industries. It comes as no surprise that UC Davis, despite its reputation for scientific integrity, has chosen not to use labs and panels with much greater expertise in the oils being tested." Furthermore there was no independent collection of samples and even with foil wrapping, an olive oil consumer or tester would be able to recognize the sample being tested; thus, the study was not "blind."

This recent study is the latest attempt by the UC Davis Olive Center to discredit the olive oil companies that compete with its supporters. "When a similar report issued last year was criticized by the IOC and others, UC Davis and the domestic industry decided to try again. American consumers can certainly trust the quality, purity and value of heart-healthy imported olive oils and they will quickly understand this 'study,' like the prior 'study,' is nothing more than a crass marketing ploy by California olive oil producers," Bauer said.

"It's revealing to note that the domestic olive oil industry has pushed for standards less stringent than the IOC standards that NAOOA members have adopted, because they said their olive oils can't meet those standards. Yet they use and emphasize subjective and rejected tests to try to make people believe imported oils don't meet those more-stringent standards," said Bauer. "Consumers knew better than to accept the 'findings' in UC Davis' last study and we expect the same will hold true again."