April 6, 2016

By Eric Francucci

The Italian government recently announced a commitment to invest €32 million in the Italian olive oil sector. The funds will be used to bolster the quality and quantity of production, along with promoting the “Made in Italy” brand in export markets. The plan can be further supported through regional resources for rural development.

This government intervention comes in a time of crisis, which has plagued the industry at home in Italy and abroad. In 2014, which has since been coined “annus horribilis,” Italian production was the lowest in decades. This was largely due to the spread of an infectious pest, which caused EU-mandated removal of thousands of hectares of olive trees in one of Italy’s primary producing region. To make matters worse, several cases of fraud in the labeling of the product, both in terms of quality and origin, were reported, resulting in nearly €10 million of administrative seizures and penalties in 2014, with many more instances passing by undetected. Impacts of this fraud has crossed the ocean to the U.S., one of the sector’s largest export markets, resulting in the filing of three separate lawsuits against Italian olive oil companies in 2014. More recently, in January 2016 a CBS 60 Minutes piece titled “Agromafia,” brought to life the ongoing involvement of organized crime in falsifying olive oil labeling.

“With the approval the plan, we define a producing strategy that has been missing for far too many years in Italy,”stated Maurizio Martina, the Italian Minister of Agricultural Policy, regarding the recent announcement.

Italy is the world’s second-largest producerof olive oil, after Spain. The Italian olive oil industry is estimated to be a€3 billion industry, representing 3% of the nation’s agricultural industry. Italy is home to 42 EU-recognized Protected Designation of Originproducing regions, far ahead of competitors Greece and Spain, which have 27 and 26 respectively.