Controls on olive oil: Italy excels in the EU

Thanks to a unique multi-level surveillance architecture worldwide and the integration of advanced digital registers, the Italian system not only ensures compliance with legal requirements but raises market protection and consumer protection standards. A transparency leadership that the European Court of Auditors now suggests should be considered a ‘best practice’, along with other recommendations addressed to the European Commission to strengthen the entire olive sector of the Union.

The regulatory framework and compliance checks

Theolive oil represents an emblematic product for theEuropean Union, which holds the world record as producer (61%), consumer (45%) and exporter (65%) (European Court of Auditors, 2026). The sector is governed by specific regulations defining product categories, labeling requirements and control methods, in particular through regulations (EU) 2022/2104 and 2022/2105 (Dongo, 2022).

The Member States are required to perform a minimum number of  compliance checks proportional to the marketed volumes, including physico-chemical laboratory analyses and organoleptic evaluations through tasting panels. However, the ECA report highlights that ‘Member States do not always meet all the requirements’, noting significant gaps in carrying out the prescribed checks.

Audit results: critical issues and best practices

The analysis by the European Court of Auditors covered the period 2018-2023, focusing on four Member States: Spain, Italy, Greece, and Belgium. The investigation found that despite the existence of a comprehensive European regulatory framework, the application of controls is uneven among different producing and consuming countries. Some Member States, in particular, do not reach the  minimum number of checks required by European legislation.

Greece has systematically carried out fewer checks than necessary (except in 2023), while Spain has drastically reduced controls on the category since 2020. Greece and Belgium have excluded significant market segments from their controls without adequate justification based on risk analysis, compromising the overall effectiveness of surveillance. The  laboratory analyses are often incomplete, as only the Spanish authorities have analyzed all 15 mandatory parameters, while Greece, Belgium, and Italy have omitted some tests (European Court of Auditors, 2026).

Italian excellence in controls and traceability

Despite some gaps in laboratory analyses, Italy emerges as a reference model for theorganization of controls and traceability systems traceabilityThe Italian authorities have developed a multi-level surveillance architecture involving not only the Central Inspectorate for the Protection of Quality and Repression of Fraud in Agri-food Products (ICQRF) and the customs agency, but also three police forces with investigative powers (Carabinieri, Guardia di Finanza, and the Coast Guard). In 2021, a specific focus group on the olive oil sector was established, supported by the Institute of Services for the Agricultural Food Market (ISMEA), which annually examines and updates therisk factors and possible criticalities (European Court of Auditors, 2026).

A distinctive element of the Italian system concerns the  training of inspectors: many receive training on organoleptic evaluation and are members of official tasting panels for olive oil, thus being able to more accurately identify non-compliant oils during sampling. Italy has also introduced the mandatory indication of the harvest year for extra virgin and virgin oils of Italian origin and packaged in Italy sold in the national territory, when 100% of the oils come from that harvest (law 9/2013, article 7.3). The sanctioning system Italian system stands out for the speed of procedures (1.2 months on average) and for the deterrent effect, with penalties commensurate to the quantities of non-compliant oils (Legislative Decree 103/2016, article 9).

Electronic registers for complete traceability

Both Italy and Spain have developed  national electronic registers mandatory documents that document every movement of olive oil along the supply chain, a tool that significantly exceeds the minimum European 'one step back, one step forward' traceability requirements:

• In Italy, operators must register every movement within six days in the SIAN (National Agricultural Information System) telematic register. See DM 16059/2013; MIPAAF, 2015);

• In Spain, internal movements must be registered in real time and external ones in advance (the system generates the transport document that accompanies the oil).

These registers allow authorities to verify the origin of products up to the olive growers and the cadastral plots where the olives were cultivated. During compliance checks, Italy and Spain systematically verify the origin at all stages of the  supply chain and perform mass balances to prevent fraud and ensure quality (European Court of Auditors, 2026).

The Italian system also makes it possible to monitor uncategorized olive oil held in warehouses, requiring the mandatory indication of origin even for bulk product. This capillarity of controls is reflected in the results: during the sample study conducted by the ECA, all the Italian olive oils of national origin could be traced up to the geographical area of harvesting and pressing required by the regulations, with the 100% traceable at least up to the mills. In contrast, for oils of mixed origin or coming from multiple Member States, cross-border cooperation proved less effective, highlighting the need to harmonize the different national systems (European Court of Auditors, 2026).

Contaminants and food safety

Regarding the  contaminant controls, the audit found a clear regulatory framework for pesticide residues, with coordinated multi-year control programs at the European level. The visited Member States conduct risk-based controls, rarely finding cases of non-compliance. However, for contaminants other than pesticides (such as mineral oil hydrocarbons, plasticizers, dioxins, and PCBs), the system is less developed.

A common critical issue in all visited Member States concerns controls onimported olive oil from non-EU countries: although the EU imports the equivalent of 9% of its annual production, checks on pesticides and other contaminants are non-existent or very limited (European Court of Auditors, 2026; European Food Safety Authority, 2023).

Recommendations of the European Court of Auditors

The ECA report makes five specific recommendations to the European Commission:

• strengthening of supervision of Member States' control systems, requesting appropriate information on risk analyses, controls carried out, and sanctions applied, with evaluation of compliance with European requirements and adoption of proportionate actions when systems are insufficient (implementation deadline: 2027-2028);

• clarify the rules on blending of virgin olive oils coming from different harvest years or different categories, an aspect currently lacking sufficiently explicit harmonized rules (deadline: 2026);

• improve the guidelines for contaminant controls, requesting Member States to provide details on risk analysis, verified contaminants and control frequency, with explicit consideration of imported olive oil (deadline: 2026).

• provide clarifications and guidance on verification requirements of  traceability, specifying what such controls should cover and how the results should be reported (deadline: 2027);

• improve olive oil traceability by encouraging and supporting Member States that have not done so to develop registers to document the movement of olives and oil, improving compatibility of different systems to facilitate cross-border traceability (deadline: 2028) (European Court of Auditors, 2026).

Conclusions

The report of the European Court of Auditors highlights how the existence of a comprehensive system of uniform rules does not automatically guarantee its effective application in the different Member States. TheItalian experience shows that integrating multi-level controls, specialized inspector training, advanced electronic traceability systems, and swift and effective sanctions constitutes a virtuous model to ensure the authenticity and safety of marketed olive oil.

However, common issues persist at the European level, particularly regarding the completeness of laboratory analyses, the controls on imported products non-EU and cross-border cooperation for origin verification. Implementing the European Court of Auditors' recommendations, along with spreading Italian and Spanish best practices in traceability, could significantly help strengthen consumer protection and the reputation of European olive oil in international markets.

Dario Dongo

Photo by Lucio Patone on Unsplash

Bibliography

• Ciancio, R., & Capecci, R. (2023). Practical Guide to Olive Oil Labeling (3rd ed.). Central Inspectorate for Quality Protection and Fraud Repression of Agri-food Products (ICQRF). Practical guide to the labelling of olive oil 3rd edition

• Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2022/2104 of 29 July 2022 supplementing Regulation (EU) No 1308/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council as regards marketing standards for olive oil. Current consolidated version: 10/06/2024 http://data.europa.eu/eli/reg_del/2022/2104/2024-06-10

• Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2022/2105 of 29 July 2022 laying down rules on conformity checks of marketing standards for olive oil and methods of analysis of the characteristics of olive oil. Consolidated text: 11/11/2024 http://data.europa.eu/eli/reg_impl/2022/2105/2024-11-11

• Legislative Decree 23 May 2016, no. 103. Penalty provisions for violation of Regulation (EU) no. 29/2012 relating to the marketing standards for olive oil and Regulation (EEC) no. 2568/91 relating to the characteristics of olive oils and olive-pomace oils, as well as the related methods. Normattiva (last update to the act published 13/07/2024). https://www.normattiva.it/uri-res/N2Ls?urn:nir:stato:decreto.legislativo:2016-05-23;103

• Dongo, D. (2022, 20 November). Marketing of olive oils, EU reg. 2022/2104. FT (Food Times). https://www.foodtimes.eu/it/sistemi-alimentari/commercializzazione-degli-oli-di-oliva-reg-ue-2022-2104/

• Dongo, D. (2022, 11 December). Olive oils, conformity controls. EU Reg. 2022/2105. FT (Food Times). https://www.foodtimes.eu/it/sistemi-alimentari/oli-doliva-i-controlli-di-conformita-reg-ue-2022-2105/

• European Commission, Agriculture and rural development. (2024).  Dashboard: Olive oil. https://agriculture.ec.europa.eu/data-and-analysis/markets/price-data/price-monitoring-sector/olive-oil_en

• European Court of Auditors. (2026).  Control systems for olive oil in the EU: A comprehensive framework, but unevenly applied (Special Report 01/2026). Publications Office of the European Union.  https://www.eca.europa.eu/en/publications/sr-2026-01

• Law 14 January 2013, no. 9. Rules on the quality and transparency of the virgin olive oil supply chain. Normattiva (last update to the act published on 27/12/2023). https://www.normattiva.it/uri-res/N2Ls?urn:nir:stato:legge:2013;9

• Ministry of Agricultural, Food and Forestry Policies, MIPAAF. (2015). Electronic oil register: examples of compilation (Version 1, August 3, 2015). https://www.masaf.gov.it/flex/cm/pages/ServeAttachment.php/L/IT/D/a%252F4%252F3%252FD.47886416ed83b9becefa/P/BLOB%3AID%3D8980/E/pdf?mode=download