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Olive oil guide

Olive oil, from tree to label.

Where olive oil comes from, how it is graded, and what the label on the bottle really tells you. Written by a family that has pressed olives in southern Tunisia since 1958.

1History

People have grown olives for about six thousand years. The tree, the oil and the trade grew up together around the Mediterranean, and North Africa has been at the centre of that trade for most of its history.

  1. c. 4000 BC

    The olive is first cultivated in Asia Minor, today’s Türkiye, and spreads along the coasts of the eastern Mediterranean.[10]

  2. 9th century BC

    Phoenician traders found Carthage, near today’s Tunis. Olive growing and the oil trade spread along the coast of North Africa and the western Mediterranean.

  3. 1st–3rd century AD

    Rome imports oil by the shipload in clay amphorae, mostly from Baetica in southern Spain, but also from Byzacena (today’s Tunisia) and Tripolitania (Libya). The broken jars piled up into Monte Testaccio in Rome: an estimated 53 million amphorae.[9]

  4. 1958

    Our mill opens in southern Tunisia. Salem works the presses.

  5. 1959

    The International Olive Council (then the International Olive Oil Council) is founded in Madrid to set world trade standards for olive oil.

  6. 1998

    The EU–Tunisia Association Agreement enters into force. Tunisia can export up to 56,700 tonnes of olive oil a year to the EU duty-free.[5]

  7. 2024/25

    World production reaches 3.57 million tonnes. Spain makes 1.42 million; Tunisia 340,000.[1]

2Where it is made

Olive trees need long, dry summers and mild winters, so almost all olive oil comes from around the Mediterranean. In the 2024/25 season the world made about 3.57 million tonnes. Spain alone made about 40% of it.[1]

Harvests swing a lot from year to year with heat and rain. Spain’s 2024/25 crop was up 66% on the drought year before, and Italy’s was down 25%.[1]

Olive oil production, 2024/25
AlbaniaArmeniaAustriaAzerbaijanBelgiumBulgariaBosnia and HerzegovinaBelarusSwitzerlandNorthern CyprusCyprusCzech RepublicGermanyAlgeriaEgyptSpainFranceUnited KingdomGeorgiaGreeceCroatiaHungaryIrelandIranIraqItalyJordanKazakhstanKosovoLebanonLibyaLithuaniaLuxembourgMoroccoMoldovaMacedoniaMaltaMontenegroMauritaniaNetherlandsPolandPortugalRomaniaRussiaWestern SaharaSaudi ArabiaRepublic of SerbiaSlovakiaSloveniaSyriaTunisiaTurkeyUkrainePalestineSpain: 1,419,000 tTürkiye: 505,000 tTunisia: 340,000 tGreece: 250,000 tItaly: 248,000 tPortugal: 177,000 t

Circle area shows production in tonnes. Provisional figures. Source: [1]

The six largest producers, 2024/25
Spain1,419,000 t · 40%
Türkiye505,000 t · 14%
Tunisia340,000 t · 10%
Greece250,000 t · 7%
Italy248,000 t · 7%
Portugal177,000 t · 5%
All other countries633,000 t · 18%

Tonnes of olive oil. Provisional figures; all other countries together made 633,000 t. Source: [1]

Show the data
CountryTonnesShare of world
Spain1,419,000 t39.7%
Türkiye505,000 t14.1%
Tunisia340,000 t9.5%
Greece250,000 t7%
Italy248,000 t6.9%
Portugal177,000 t5%
All other countries633,000 t17.7%

3Quality grades

In the EU and the UK, “olive oil” is not one product. The law sets eight categories, defined by lab tests (above all free acidity, a measure of damaged fruit) and by a tasting panel that checks for defects and fruitiness.[2][3]

Free acidity limits for virgin oils
Extra virgin olive oilVirgin olive oilLampante olive oilnot sold to the public
Free acidity →
  • Extra virgin olive oil: 0–0.8%
  • Virgin olive oil: 0.8%–2.0%
  • Lampante olive oil: > 2.0% (not sold to the public)

Maximum free acidity, % oleic acid. Acidity rises when olives are bruised, damaged or left too long before pressing. Source: [2]

Extra virgin olive oil

≤ 0.8%

Pressed from fresh olives by mechanical means only. Must taste fruity and have no defects at all.

On shop shelves

The best grade. Noor makes only this.

Virgin olive oil

≤ 2.0%

Also only mechanically pressed, but may have slight taste defects.

On shop shelvesLess common in shops.

Lampante olive oil

> 2.0%

Defective oil, named after the oil lamps it once fuelled. Not fit to eat as it is.

Not sold to the publicSent to refineries.

Refined olive oil

≤ 0.3%

Lampante oil refined with heat and filtering to remove faults. Neutral taste, very low acidity.

Not sold to the publicUsed to make the blend below.

Olive oil (refined and virgin)

≤ 1.0%

Mostly refined oil with some virgin oil for flavour. Often sold as “pure” or “light” olive oil.

On shop shelvesCommon on shelves.

Olive pomace oil

≤ 1.0%

Extracted with solvents from the paste left after pressing, then refined and blended with virgin oil.

On shop shelvesMostly for frying and catering.

  • Low acidity only means something for virgin oils. Refined oils have very low acidity because refining strips it out, along with most of the taste and the antioxidants.
  • “Light” describes the flavour, not the calories. All olive oils have the same energy.

4From grove to bottle

Extra virgin oil is fruit juice: it is made by crushing olives and separating the oil, with no heat and no chemicals.

  1. HarvestOlives are picked, ideally just as they turn from green to purple.
  2. CleanLeaves and twigs are blown off; the olives are washed.
  3. CrushOlives and stones are ground into a paste.
  4. MalaxThe paste is mixed slowly so the oil droplets join up.
  5. SeparateA centrifuge spins the oil away from the water and the solids.
  6. Store and bottleThe oil settles in steel tanks, away from light and air, then is bottled with a lot number.

The faster olives go from tree to mill, the lower the acidity and the fresher the taste. That is why we press on the day of picking. On labels, “cold extraction” may only be used for oil extracted below 27 °C.[4]

5Tunisian oil in European bottles

Tunisia has about 1.8 million hectares of olive groves, more than a third of its farmland, and is the world’s largest olive oil exporter outside the EU.[8][5] Most of its trees are Chemlali, which gives a soft, sweet oil, with Chetoui in the north.[8]

Yet very little of that oil reaches shoppers under a Tunisian name. Between 80% and 91% of Tunisia’s exports leave in bulk, in tankers and containers, rather than in bottles.[5] In the 2024/25 season, bulk sales were about 78% of exports, at an average of €2.7 per kilo.[6]

Where Tunisia’s bulk oil goes
AlbaniaArmeniaAustriaAzerbaijanBelgiumBulgariaBosnia and HerzegovinaBelarusSwitzerlandNorthern CyprusCyprusCzech RepublicGermanyAlgeriaEgyptSpainFranceUnited KingdomGeorgiaGreeceCroatiaHungaryIrelandIranIraqItalyJordanKazakhstanKosovoLebanonLibyaLithuaniaLuxembourgMoroccoMoldovaMacedoniaMaltaMontenegroMauritaniaNetherlandsPolandPortugalRomaniaRussiaWestern SaharaSaudi ArabiaRepublic of SerbiaSlovakiaSloveniaSyriaTunisiaTurkeyUkrainePalestineTunisiaSpainItaly← North America
  • 58% Europe, mainly Spain and Italy
  • 26.4% North America
  • 15.6% Rest of the world

Share of Tunisia’s low-priced olive oil exports, November 2024 to September 2025. Source: [6]

Two routes from the same groves

The bulk route

  1. Tunisian groves
  2. Tunisian mill
  3. Tanker to Spain or Italy
  4. Blended with other oils
  5. Bottled under a European brand
  6. Sold worldwide

Bottled at source

  1. Our groves
  2. Our mill, same day
  3. Bottled in Tunisia
  4. Harvest date and lot on the label
  5. Sold as Tunisian oil

European packers buy Tunisian oil because it is good and costs less. Some of it enters the EU duty-free under Tunisia’s annual quota of 56,700 tonnes.[5] More can come in duty-free under “inward processing”: the oil is blended and bottled in the EU on condition that the finished product is exported again, often under a Spanish or Italian brand name.[5]

All of this is legal. The label must state where the oil comes from, but for a blend it does not have to name the countries or say how much of each is inside.[3][5]

What the label is allowed to say

  • “Blend of olive oils of European Union origin”
  • “Blend of olive oils not of European Union origin”
  • “Blend of olive oils of European Union origin and not of European Union origin”

In the UK the wording is either the list of countries or “blend of olive oils from more than one country”.[4]

Breaking these rules is fraud, and it does happen. In 2015 Italian police and anti-mafia prosecutors in Bari investigated about 7,000 tonnes of oil sold as “100% Italian” extra virgin that DNA tests showed were blends of oil from Syria, Turkey, Morocco and Tunisia.[7]

A bottle with an Italian name and a Tuscan hillside on the label may hold oil from southern Tunisia. There is nothing wrong with the oil. But the value of the brand, the bottle and the story stays with the packer. That is why we bottle our own oil at the mill, under our own name.

6How to read a label

Every bottle of extra virgin olive oil sold in the UK and the EU must carry certain information. Here is what to look for, and what it means.

Example label1EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL2Origin: Tunisia3Harvest 2026/274Best before: 11/20285Lot N26-0146Bottled by: …
  1. 1
    Category

    “Extra virgin olive oil”, or another of the legal grades. Anything else, like “pure” or “light”, is marketing.

  2. 2
    Origin

    A single country, or a blend wording. A blend wording means the oil comes from more than one country.

  3. 3
    Harvest date

    Optional. Allowed only if all of the oil comes from that harvest.[3] The best sign of freshness.

  4. 4
    Best before

    Usually about 18 months to two years after bottling. It says nothing about when the olives were picked.

  5. 5
    Lot number

    Links the bottle to one batch at the mill. On our bottles, you can look it up.

  6. 6
    Bottler’s name and address

    Where the oil was bottled, which may not be where it was grown.

7Keeping it fresh

Olive oil’s enemies are light, heat and air.

  • Buy oil in dark glass or tins, never clear bottles.
  • Store it in a cupboard, away from the cooker and the window.
  • Close the cap after use, and finish an open bottle within a couple of months.
  • Refill a small bottle from a tin rather than opening a large bottle over and over.

8References

  1. Olive sector statistics – December 2025 and forecasts. International Olive Council, 12 January 2026.
  2. Olive oil in the EU. European Commission, Agriculture and Rural Development, accessed October 2026.
  3. Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2022/2104 on marketing standards for olive oil. EUR-Lex, 29 July 2022.
  4. Regulation (EU) No 29/2012 on marketing standards for olive oil, Articles 4 and 5 (as in force in the UK). legislation.gov.uk, accessed October 2026.
  5. Tunisian olive oil in a globalised world. Export relations with the EU. EST – European Student Think Tank, 26 March 2025.
  6. Falling prices and fraud claims cloud Tunisia’s olive oil boom. Olive Oil Times, 5 November 2025.
  7. Police uncover 7,000-ton olive oil fraud in Italy. Olive Oil Times, 3 December 2015.
  8. Olive farming in Tunisia. Olio Officina, n.d.
  9. Monte Testaccio. Wikipedia, accessed October 2026.
  10. History of the olive tree. International Olive Council, accessed October 2026.